


Apotheosis

by SolainRhyo



Category: Thor - All Media Types
Genre: Complete, Drama & Romance, F/M, lokane - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-14
Updated: 2015-11-03
Packaged: 2018-01-01 13:53:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 78,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1044736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SolainRhyo/pseuds/SolainRhyo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jane's life started to end after the fall of Malekith. She's learned the hard way that even loving a god can't keep you safe from all evils. To salvage the remnants of both her life and her sanity, she's gone into hiding. She knew her dealings with Asgard were far from over, but she never expected to have to contend with Loki again. Lokane. Post TDW.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wayward Arrival

**_Disclaimer (applies to the story in its entirety):_ ** _I don’t own any of it._

**.1.**  

 

Almost a year after Malekith was defeated, the first of Thor's enemies found her. 

Jane Foster was an ordinary human being who had experienced extraordinary things. The love of an Asgardian price was foremost among those. Some of the others were pleasant in the same vein—she'd seen Asgard, after all, and experienced the exhilarating and otherworldly method of travel to get there. 

The other extraordinary things—well, they were what led her here, to a place far from Puente Antiguo, far from London, far from New York.  She had gone to ground, the last resort of the desperate. The Jane Foster from a year ago had not been familiar with this particular brand of desperation, the type that had her eyes finding threats in every lingering shadow and her ears hearing the promise of pain in every whisper which carried her way. No, this desperation was the stigma of the new Jane Foster, who had become something exceptionally important to numerous dangerous, innovative creatures in the universe: she was the one true potent weakness of Thor. And, as a result, Thor's ties to the Avengers had earned her a questionable kind of merit in the eyes of those who had cause to resent the team of Earth's defenders. 

It turned out, even on a planet as overpopulated as Earth, she wasn't that hard to find. And yes, she'd been under S.H.I.E.L.D's protective jurisdiction because of her ties to Thor. But even S.H.I.E.L.D couldn't have predicted what was coming. 

The first to find her had been a terrorist, intent on using her as a bargaining chip in order to control the Avengers. 

The second enemy had wanted blood for blood, vengeance for a loved one lost at the hands of the Asgardians. 

The third—the worst—was the one that had caused her to flee, to hide, to change from a regular person into a _survivor_.

 

**.x.**

When she'd lived there, Jane had had a healthy dislike of New Mexico's heat accompanied by a reluctant appreciation for the haggard, sun-ravaged splendor of its landscape. When the realization finally hit her that to remain Jane Foster was to court imminent death, she'd made the choice to hide somewhere she'd never been before, someplace remote without being too much so. She'd had support from S.H.I.E.L.D, to a degree—Nick Fury agreed that she needed to be someone else, someplace else, in order to stop being the inadvertent cause of so much trouble. Thor had rescued her once since the fall of Malekith. During the other subsequent abductions, her rescuers had been members of the Avengers, and Fury was of the very strong opinion that one human life did not merit the heroes of Earth repeatedly placing themselves in extreme danger. 

She'd been given a new name, a new background, and sufficient funding to exist on her own someplace far removed from the cities and countries that seemed the most inviting for the villains of both earth and the rest of the universe. She'd said goodbye to those that mattered and inwardly grieved for those she'd lost. And then she'd packed only what she needed and drove north, crossing numerous state lines before crossing the border.

 

**.x.**

 

She found the home she needed near the Rockies. An acreage bordering a woodlot, set on the borders of the flats where the foothills began. The house was nearly new but small, the property hemmed at all sides by dense forest. The closest town—population 4000—was a thirty minute drive away. She had power, plumbing, and satellite TV. She even had Internet, when the weather permitted. She saw the home and the acres around it for what it was: a refuge. A bolt hole. A place to be alive without always being haunted by the shadows of an imminent threat. Before she made the purchase—S.H.I.E.L.D had been monetarily generous for their part in her relocation—the real estate agent gave her a warning. 

"Have you lived through a winter up here?" She'd asked Jane, who was no longer Jane. When the only reply was a shake of the head, the agent went on slowly, her eyes straying to Jane's left hand. Jane noticed and reflexively tightened her hand into a fist. The agent glanced away awkwardly, clearing her throat before going on. "Look—it's a nice place. And the price is good, too. But I have to warn you, in winter, when it snows a lot—and it will—there will be days the roads are impassable. Out here we don't have much in the way of public works services. There may be entire days that pass when you won't be able to go anywhere until a grader comes by." 

The warning was delivered in a somber, reluctant tone; she was a real estate agent, after all, and Jane was a sale. But Jane, who had introduced herself as Jill Garritsen, had simply flashed a sad and fleeting smile. 

"It sounds perfect," she'd said, and meant it.

 

**.x.**

The Canadian winter wasn't as bad as she'd feared it would be. It took a lot of adjustment, but her life for the past several months has been one extended period of adjustment, so that wasn't anything unfamiliar to her. 

When the first snow of the season began to fall, she stood at the largest window in the living room of her new home and watched with a sense of mutual unease and wonder. The hours passed and slowly, gently, the world without was enveloped in white. There were no streetlights outside, no warm glow from a neighbour's window. There was only her house and the snow-dusted woods surrounding, only a world covered in beautifully bleak shades of white and grey. 

She felt, for the first time in a long time, utterly alone. It didn't even occur to her to be worried that this was also the first time in a very long time that she'd felt safe.

 

**.x.**

 

Visiting a country in the grips of winter was one thing. Living in winter was quite another. Jane found that the season came with its own serious learning curve. She learned that heating a house entirely on propane was expensive. She had a nice sum of money in her bank account, some of it hers and some of it a living allowance from S.H.I.E.L.D, but she knew it was imperative to conserve as much money as she could in case of an emergency. Because, in her recent experiences, emergencies consisted of something dire and life-threatening that required complicated methods of escape. 

The house had a wood burning stove and the previous owners had stocked the small woodshed in the yard to full capacity. And so Jane made the effort to learn how to heat her new home entirely by wood stove. She discovered that starting a fire with the damper closed resulted in a house full of thick black smoke. She also discovered that some of the wood in the shed didn't fit into her stove; a trip to the hardware in the nearby town of Woodrill and the purchase of a splitting axe helped her rectify that problem. And as a result she discovered that chopping wood, though hard work was actually kind of cathartic. 

Winter taught her other things as well. She learned that shovelling snow from her walkway and driveway was better exercise than any kind of workout she could get in a gym. She learned that on the really cold days her vehicle wouldn't start unless the block heater had been plugged in. She learned that wearing the bulkiest, heaviest coat in the world would never be warm enough without layers underneath. She also learned that running frostbitten fingers and toes underneath warm water was—almost—the most painful thing she'd ever known. 

Despite all the extra work winter entailed, she found she didn't mind. She liked to be busy. She'd made a half-hearted promise to S.H.I.E.L.D to continue her research once she was settled far and away from danger with a new name and a new life. Every time she sat down with her notebooks and laptop, however, she found that her mind drifted too easily to the events that had led her to flee the life she'd known. _Later_ , she would tell herself before getting up and moving on to something else. 

It was just as hard to keep her mind from wandering to thoughts of Thor. Granted, these thoughts were more pleasant than the others, but they came with no small amount of negative emotions. After Malekith's defeat, Thor had returned to Earth several times to see her. He explained that Heimdall was always aware of where she was and whether or not she was safe. This was why Thor had been the one to come to her aid the first time his enemies had found her. 

Things began to change not long after that particular rescue. During one of his visits, he explained to her that things were changing in Asgard. They were small, subtle changes implemented by his father, but they were changes all the same and he was uncertain of how they would be of any benefit to Asgard. 

"There is something ... different about my father," he told her one night, after they'd dined in her small apartment, after they'd sat on the balcony and spoke of simpler, easier things. He'd slid his hand free of hers and stood, placing his elbows on the balcony railing, staring out across the lights of the city. "I know not what it is for certain. I cannot explain it any better. Ever since mother's death, ever since Loki ..." 

He trailed off. Jane, sitting in an Adirondack chair behind him, felt her throat tighten with empathy. She knew he was struggling to reconcile his roles as prince and protector of Midgard. She knew too, how much it cost him to visit her here when his presence was demanded elsewhere. 

"I am stymied, Jane. My father speaks to me as he always has, but it is different. I fear he is ill, hiding some malady for fear of what may happen. But when I ask, he evades my questions as adeptly as my brother used to." 

"Thor—" she said, coming to her feet. 

"I tell you this," he interrupted, turning to face her, "because I fear my visits here will be hindered soon. There is unrest in other realms that I must attend to. And there is unrest at home, as well." 

She told him she understood. She told him it was okay. And that night, after he'd kissed her goodbye in a manner that was utterly bittersweet, he said goodbye to her with a heaviness that was mirrored in her heart and mind. 

That was the last time she'd seen him. 

Later, when the other enemies found her, she'd wished and wept and _prayed_ for his intervention. But he could not come. He did not come. And she suffered greatly for the mere transgression of having his love. 

He was a prince. He was meant to rule. He had to restore peace on a galactic level. All of this she knew and had known. But she found, in the darkest days of her life after being captured the third time, that this radiant, otherworldly love she'd cherished for a god was slowly turning to poison.

 

**.x.**

The day the storm came she was outside. She'd just finished splitting wood and had loaded it into a wheelbarrow when she became aware of the sky darkening. Breathing hard from the exertion of swinging the axe, she tugged off her hood and glanced upwards. The day had been overcast with small flurries every now and then, but the clouds now gathering were different from what she was accustomed to seeing in the winter sky. These were clouds more suited to hot summer skies, angry and roiling and dark. 

She felt a sudden sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach as thunder boomed overhead. There was no denying what was happening—a conduit was forming. Her first instinct was to bolt, run to her truck and drive hell-bent for any destination but here. On the heels of that urge came anger. He was coming _now_? When the worst was over and she'd bitterly, angrily learned to heal on her own? 

The conduit, as it shot to earth with all the beauty and mystery and power of the universe still veiled to her, startled her enough that she uttered a short, soft cry. And then it was over, as quickly as it had come, the churning clouds dissipating, leaving behind the familiar pale grey cloud cover of a normal winter day. But in the aftermath, she stood alone. The conduit had not touched ground anywhere near her house. It had struck the earth somewhere to the south, in the forest that bordered her property. 

She stood where she was for a span of moments, considering. It was now obvious that Heimdall watched her still, which also meant that Thor must be aware of what had happened. Was he free, finally, of the duties of his birthright? Had he come to explain it all? 

Did she want him too? 

When she finally stirred, her movements were unhurried. She pushed the wheelbarrow back to her house, parking it off to the side of the small deck that spanned the front wall of her home. Later, she'd take in a couple armfuls of wood so that she had fuel enough for the night ahead. She pulled her hood back up and rewrapped the scarf around her neck, making sure it was tight. With a sigh, she turned and began trudging through the snow towards the southern edge of her property, headed in the direction the conduit had touched down. 

Reaching the outskirts of the woods, she was relieved to see game trails carved into the snow. She chose the one that seemed most travelled and followed it into the trees. The huge evergreens were blanketed in snow, boughs draping downwards. She moved with care, stepping over fallen logs and ducking under branches and trees that leaned. More than once she jostled an overhanging branch and found herself caught in the resulting shower of heavy, glistening white flakes. 

Even with the game trail, it was hard work to walk through the snow. When the trail abruptly veered off to the east, she paused and sighed. There were no trails leading due south, which was where the conduit had been, and standing in her way was a sizeable hill covered entirely in a pristine white blanket. She sighed again, a heavy and resigned exhale. She was tired. She was nervous. She wasn't entirely certain she wanted to face the man who lay beyond the hill again, anyways. After a short and intense internal debate, she stepped off the game trail and began to slowly trudge her way up the hill through snow that, at its highest, brushed against her knees. 

It took her long minutes to climb to the top. She stopped frequently to rest, her legs burning from breaking a trail, her lungs aching from gulping in huge breaths of frigid air. Beneath her layers, she was sweating from the exertion. She pulled at the scarf that covered half her face, loosening it so it fell away from her face to allow her to breathe easier. Sucking in a deep breath, she started to move again, walking with dogged determination and proceeding upwards until, finally, she crested the hill. 

At first, she couldn't clearly see what lay on the ground below, her vision impeded by the billowing clouds of steam created by her ragged exhales. When finally her eyes could focus on the scene below, she frowned in anxious confusion. 

The conduit had been a violent one. A small crater lay at the base of the hill, the snow around it explosively dispersed in a large radius by the strength of the impact. Several trees which had lined the base of the hill had been broken or knocked over completely by the occurrence. A tall, slender tree, uprooted, had fallen across the width of the crater. Pinned beneath the tree was a man. 

Her mind did not initially process what her eyes were witnessing. The man, initially motionless when first her gaze had found him, was starting to move. He lay on his back, arms coming up slowly, sluggishly, to push at the tree where it lay across his chest. It shifted easily as he pushed; it was a young poplar and didn't weigh too much. What Jane couldn't understand as she watched was why the effort of dislodging it seemed so hard to him. 

What she couldn't understand was why, lying in a small crater in the middle of a snowy forest, Loki would throw back his head and unleash a scream of primal, helpless rage that echoed throughout the forest and resonated within her mind with terrible, desperate purpose. 

Comprehension dawned a heartbeat later, and she felt an echo of his scream claw its way up from her lungs into her throat. She choked it back with some difficulty, reeling beneath the weight of the revelation she'd just had. Below her Loki labored to free himself from the confines of the fallen tree. Even from where she stood she could see that he was breathing hard, laboring as any man would. 

As any mortal would. 

He was garbed in gold and green much as he had been when last she'd seen him—dying, in Thor's arms. The garment would not offer much protection against the cold. Left unattended, at the whims of winter's merciless nature, there was a very good chance he would die as he was now. 

Jane began to tremble with fury. Here, then, was her proof that Thor still thought of her. He hadn't come himself. No, he'd sent his brother, the war criminal, to Earth. He'd stripped Loki of his immortality and his powers and rendered him as helpless as the humans he so despised. Thor had sentenced his brother to the same punishment he himself had known from Odin. For some reason that she was sure she could never understand, Thor had sent Loki to Jane. She knew with utmost certainty that Thor had done this as a way to keep Loki safe. Had he arrived elsewhere in the world, chances were better than good that S.H.I.E.L.D would find him and imprison him. And there were others, many others, that had scores to settle with Loki after the events of New York. 

Thor's plea to Jane was as plain and clear as if he'd uttered the words into her ear. _Here is my brother, mortal now. He cannot harm you. I ask of you this: watch over him. Hide him. Keep him safe. Please, Jane._  

The sound that left her was half desperate laugh, half strangled sob. And at the sound, Loki's head whipped around. He was still in the process of extricating himself from the tree, but he stopped when he saw her standing above him. For a span of moments, suspended by the gamut of emotions that coursed through them both, they stared at each other. That he recognized her she had no doubt. 

Her first instinct, infuriatingly, was to go to him. To pull the tree off of him. To hit him. To strike him as she would strike Thor were he here, to brutalize him with all the anguish and regret and fury she felt now, had been feeling for so many long months. 

Instead, she pulled the scarf back up over her mouth and nose. And she turned and began to retrace her steps back down the hill, towards home.

 

**.x.**

 

 

 

 

 


	2. Unwelcome Confluence

**_Sol's Notes:_ ** _Thank you to everyone who reviewed. This is my first venture into the fandom and I really appreciate each and every piece of feedback. I hope you enjoy where the story goes._

 

**.2.**

 

Once upon a time—a very short time ago, in fact—Jane had been a victim. She'd played the part flawlessly. The credit wasn't entirely her own, of course; Fate had deemed her acceptable for the role and had thrust her unwittingly into it. Her initial experiences as a victim had included danger, yes. There was even the potential that she could have lost her life. In Svartalfheim, as she hung suspended in the air with the Aether pouring out of her and into  Malekith while Thor lay injured on the ground, she had been certain that she was about to die. It had not been a welcome revelation. 

Even after their return to Midgard, as they attempted to thwart Malekith's attempts at heralding in a universal dark age, she'd been aware that her life was miniscule and insignificant when compared to the broader view. And the broader view as she'd so recently been forced to realize, encompassed a great deal more than she'd ever considered possible. But they'd triumphed in the end. She'd loved Thor and he loved her and the worst was over. 

It was what she had wanted to believe, at least. 

Looking back, her outlook at that time had been laughably pathetic. In what reality would a relationship with a god from another realm ever be simple? She'd seen things, done things, been part of things that no other human had. Life was never again going to be normal. 

She began to realize this as first one, then another, and then the last of Thor's enemies found her. Surviving epic battles fought in other realms did not a heroine make. She thought she'd had a handle on the world, even this strange new one in which she loved the god of thunder. She thought she could take everything—even the very frightening, very alien things—in stride. 

The third time she was taken she was proven very, very wrong. 

Afterwards, Jane was no longer normal. She was a survivor. She was a casualty. She was, to some, a liability. After the third rescue, cradled in the arms of a huge green creature driven only by rage that even at his worst showed more empathy than her third abductor had, Jane decided that she was going to be something else, as well. There was no real word to describe it, no real way to project it, but it had to happen. It had to happen because otherwise life would keep throwing the worst it had her way. 

Jane was alive. And Jane would no longer be a victim. 

**.x.**

It hadn't taken her long to return home again after finding Loki in the forest. She'd retraced her steps with a swiftness born from a number of emotions, none of them pleasant. Twice, she'd halted in her tracks and spun around, half-expecting to see the trickster right behind her. But she was alone, the only furrows in the snow from her passing, the only panted, steaming breath her own. 

That he would eventually follow she had no doubt. No small part of her hoped he was too weak and too disoriented from all that had just transpired to make it on his own. She told herself she didn't care that Thor had entrusted his deceitful brother to her for safe keeping. She told herself that if Loki died out there in the snow that it wouldn't bother her. And while there was moderate truth to what she was telling herself there was, as always, the familiar undercurrent of uncertainty that she'd learned to hate more than anything. 

She warred with herself internally. Eventually, one side won. She wouldn't go back for him. She would, however, prepare for his arrival. If he managed to make it. 

Feeling bone-weary and numb, she trudged over to the door of her house. Casting another glance back over her shoulder to ascertain she was still alone, she opened the door and closed it behind her. The interior of the house was charmingly rustic, the walls and roof made of cedar. The entry where she stood now was small without being confining. Coats hung from a row of hooks on one wall and an open closet was situated within the other. Without removing her coat or boots, Jane moved towards the closet and dropped to a crouch. On the floor in the closet were a number of boxes and rubber containers, some empty, some still full of items from her previous life. She grabbed one with a masking tape label on the lid. Scrawled in marker in her own hand it read, unhelpfully, "stuff". 

It only took her a moment of rummaging in the box to find what she wanted and once it was in hand she shoved the box back into the closet. She stood, turning back towards the door, and hesitated, staring down at the object she held. 

A long time ago, in a life that seemed to have belonged to someone else entirely, Darcy had wanted Jane to purchase a weapon for self defense. Her logic was hardly flawed considering the events that had just transpired, but Jane had scoffed at the idea of carrying a gun. She didn't like guns. She didn't feel comfortable around them. And she definitely hadn't wanted to carry one around. 

Darcy had, in her own characteristic way, completely ignored Jane's wishes. One birthday, she'd presented Jane with a non-descript shopping bag, the handles sealed together by a shiny red bow. Taking the bag, Jane had commented on the weight. Darcy had merely smiled and said, "You'll need it someday," before leaving Jane alone with the gift. Jane had expected upon opening the bag to see a gun. What she found had been a slender, metal black cylinder that was nearly as long as her forearm. She'd taken it from the bag and held it up for closer inspection. The metal was cool and grooved beneath her touch. She'd frowned. What was it? 

"Flick it!" Darcy's voice had called from the other room. 

Still frowning, Jane had done as ordered. She felt something within the cylinder shift with the movement, but nothing else happened. 

"Harder!" 

She flicked her wrist hard. And the cylinder she held in her grip extended instantly, becoming as long as her arm. The very end was capped with a hard black tip. The parts that had just extended consisted of two joined lengths of tightly coiled springs. It was a weapon, a baton. 

As far as gifts from Darcy went it wasn't the weirdest she'd received. She was also beyond grateful that it wasn't a gun. Darcy had come back into the room to demonstrate how it worked. The springs allowed for extra recoil, which meant that the impact hurt more than if you'd hit someone with something unyielding. Jane, amused, had carefully tested it out on her intern. The resulting yelp and plethora of curse words had let her know that Darcy had been correct. 

"Promise me to carry it always. Put it in your purse," Darcy had insisted once she'd forgiven Jane for the minor injury. Jane had promised and done just that. When she'd returned home later that evening, however, she'd taken out the baton and put in her sock drawer. It had remained there ever since, until she'd found it again on the eve of her relocation. 

She'd never, ever advocated violence as a solution to anything. But she'd learned that tears and screams and pleas didn't solve much, either. Her lips thinning into a resolute line, Jane wrapped her gloved fingers around the baton's grip. Swallowing hard, she opened the door again and left the house again. 

**.x.**

The yard was empty, just as she'd left it. Her truck, a silvery grey half-ton crew cab, sat in the driveway, covered by a thin sheet of snow. For a moment she hesitated, unsure of what to do next. Her nerves were humming with anxiety, uncertainty, and no small amount of fear. Loki, who'd tried to dominate and rule over Earth, who'd tried to kill Thor and so many others, was somewhere nearby. And just because he was mortal now didn't mean he couldn't hurt her. Her conviction wavered. She could easily go back into the house, pack a bag, and leave. She didn't have to stay. As far as she was concerned, she owed those of Asgard nothing. Loki was not her problem. 

But she didn't want to leave. This was home. This was her stronghold, the only place she'd felt truly secure in so very long. Clinging to this newfound grim resolve, Jane stepped off the deck and strode across the yard to the woodshed, where the axe still lay with its blade buried in the chopping block. Splitting wood, she'd found, was an easy way for her to focus her thoughts and gain clarity. And clarity was something she could really, really use at this moment. 

How she knew, she wasn't sure. But she stopped in her tracks, halfway to the chopping block, and slowly turned. Loki stood there only several feet away. Even with his arms wrapped tight around his chest for warmth, he didn't look bereft of power. He didn't look lost. Clad in the gold and green she remembered him wearing in Asgard, his inky hair crowned by a dusting of snow, he still exuded the blithe arrogance and authority that made him what he was— 

A criminal. A villain. A threat. 

Upon closer inspection, Jane saw evidence of his newfound mortality. He was breathing hard from the exertion of the walk through the snow. Every exhale became a short puff of steam, unfurling away from his face to be caught and shredded by the wind. His cheeks and nose were red, exposed as they were to the elements. Even with his arms folded tight across his chest, she could see the way his shoulders shuddered as his newly mortal body struggled to retain heat. 

"Jane Foster," he said after a moment. 

She'd forgotten the sound of his voice. Thor had told her once that Loki had a nickname among the Asgardians: Silvertongue. She understood entirely where the moniker came from.

She remained silent, unsure of what to say, her only motion—unseen—to tighten her grip on the baton. 

It was he that moved, instead. He came closer, every step deliberate and purposeful as he followed the path she'd already broken through the snow. Her first instinct was to back away, to keep backing away, until he was no longer in sight. She was acutely aware, however, that the events that were about to transpire would set the stage for things to come. And she would not, could not, be perceived as a victim again. Setting her jaw, she locked her eyes on his and waited on his approach. 

 He halted only an arm's reach from where she stood and spread his arms to the side, a parody of a welcome embrace. "Not quite the warm reception my brother promised me. He was certain you would be more accommodating, considering we are almost family. Tell me, did you intend I die out there where you found me?" 

As she deliberated her answer, as the seconds ticked past, one corner of his mouth inched upwards into a small smile that managed to be both charming and mocking. 

"The possibility had had crossed my mind," she replied finally. 

His smile manifested itself fully, wide and brilliant with a cruel edge. "Thor was certain I would fare well here. Where else could I be better watched over, better _cared for_ , than under the tender ministrations of his illustrious Jane Foster?" 

"And yet," he continued conversationally, turning on the spot to get a more thorough look at his new surroundings, "when I arrive, when my mortal nursemaid finds me, she turns on her heel and leaves me behind to freeze." 

His choice of words grated on every nerve she had. With an extreme force of will she managed to unclench her jaw and force words out from between her teeth. "I suppose I'm not much of a nursemaid, then." 

"No." He swung back to face her. He tilted his head to the side, considering her. "It is almost as warm a reception as you gave me last time, do you remember?" He paused, his quicksilver smile flickering into existence yet again. "You have yet to strike me." 

 _But I want to_ , she thought. Instead, she asked the only thing that mattered. "Why are you here?" 

She watched his expression change, a mercurial shift that brought into life lines of rage and frustration that marred the skin of his brow. A heartbeat later he was smiling once more as he leaned towards her, speaking as though they were friendly conspirators. "I am afraid I was caught misbehaving again. My brother is not nearly as forgiving as he used to be. I suppose I should be grateful I am not dead." 

"I guess you can't die twice, can you?" 

He uttered a short, humorless bark of laughter. "No, indeed. Though you have to admit, my first death was entirely convincing, was it not?" 

"Why are you here?" She demanded again, determined to get to the cause of this unwanted intrusion into the life she'd just become accustomed to. 

His mien became completely serious. "Thor did not care for my disguise. Or for what I labored to do while wearing it." 

"Meaning?" 

"Meaning, Jane Foster, that I have worn the face and mantle of the Allfather this entire time. I ruled Asgard as I was meant to rule, as was my birthright!" His voice had risen, the intensity in each word so powerful that she found herself unconsciously backing a step. His eyes on hers were lit from within by a furious light, brightening their glacial hue. "Asgard was mine. And I would have had the other realms, in time. I would have brought them all to heel." 

Of that, Jane had no doubt. She'd harbored some hope—scarce, faint—that Loki's appearance on Earth meant that he'd changed. That he was wasn't still hell-bent on subjugating entire worlds. That he wasn't dangerous. Because if Thor had sent him here while he was still a threat ... 

She didn't want to know what conclusion that thought would lead to. 

Her heart was racing. Being this close to Loki was like orbiting an unstable star, mesmerizing to watch but marred by the imminent threat of an explosion. Retreating would only invite further intimidation, however, and she'd already resolved that wasn't going to happen. So she remained where she was, tension singing along every nerve in her body. 

Greatly daring, she said, "Thor realized your game?" 

His eyes narrowed. "I would not be here if he had not." 

"And Odin? Did you kill him?" 

She watched shadowed emotion flicker in his eyes at the mention of that name. "No. I spared him. A mistake I am not inclined to repeat. I let sentiment interfere with my judgement. I will not do so again." 

Aware that she was playing with fire with each successive question, Jane decided to push for more information anyways. She needed to know what had happened, why Thor had decided to send his brother here. "What did you do with him, then?" 

Again, that smile—edged, elfin, deceptive. "I must not spill all my secrets to you, Jane. Not yet, at least. Though I am certain my brother would be most impressed with you if I were to do so so quickly." 

Jane was silent for several moments, struggling to gather her thoughts. The fallen god stood motionless before her, his eyes wandering from her face to survey what lay beyond. Her throat felt tight and dry; as she cleared it, Loki's eyes snapped back to hers. "After all this, Thor let you live?" 

His lip twisted. "Thor _let_ me live? My idiot brother was wholly unaware of my deception and allowed me to continue ruling all this time. It was because of who I am—because of _what_ I am. I have grown and I have changed. I _am_ something greater. Thor did not _let_ me live. And had it come to that, he would have discovered that I am not so easily slain!" 

Though she didn't doubt that there was some truth in his words, she also knew he was omitting something, something key component that would give her the whole, entire truth of the story. The words slipped from her mouth before she could stop them, her own frustration and anger giving them heat. "But he could defeat you, couldn't he? He made you mortal ... just like me." 

She should have predicted his reaction. He surged forward and seized her by the collar of her coat, jerking her up so that her face was directly beneath his. "I am no mortal!" 

She was no fighter. He was, though not in the same way as Thor. In Svartalfheim, as she'd lain helpless and exhausted on the ground after the Aether had left her, she'd watched Loki singlehandedly take on six of the dark elves without even receiving so much as a flesh wound.  He'd done so with such skill as to make it seem effortless. Loki was dangerous. Loki was deadly. And she had just made the questionable to decision to fight back. 

With her free hand, she shoved him hard, away from her. The other hand flicked out to the side, the baton snapping to its full length. Staggering slightly, he retreated a step, his eyes darting to her hand, to what she held. She advanced on him, knowing that to falter was to fail and charged into him with enough force that he had to struggle to maintain his balance. As he corrected his stance and reached for her again she lashed out with the baton. The first blow landed along the length of his thigh, eliciting a hiss of pain. She struck again but he caught her wrist in one hand. The expression on his face was terrifying, but she'd gone too far to back down now. She lifted her free hand to deliver a slap but he intercepted that blow too, catching her by the elbow. 

He grappled with her. In any other reality, he would have snapped her arm like a twig. In this reality, stripped of his powers and wearied by his earlier exertions, his strength was flagging. With one foot she stomped down hard on his. He sucked in a pained breath, his grip on her wrist loosening, and she jumped to take the slight advantage. The baton striped against his side, his shoulder, and his forearm as he raised it to ward off her blows. He tried to knife around her and almost succeeded, but his movements were slow, uncoordinated—he wasn't accustomed to this mortal flesh and the limitations that came with it. She saw another opening and took it, striping the baton across the back of his knees. He fell, trying to catch himself by fisting one hand in her coat before toppling completely as she struck him one final time. 

He'd rolled to his back, arms raised protectively over his face. She stood over him, the baton held in a trembling, white knuckle grip. Both of them were breathing hard. Jane felt sick to her stomach, a roiling, terrifying nausea. She'd never deliberately struck someone with the intent to wound before. To make it even worse, she was experiencing exhilaration in a way she'd never felt it before. She hadn't been submissive. She hadn't given way. And she found in an unwelcome revelation that a part of her had actually enjoyed attacking him. 

It was difficult to hear anything given the way her pulse thundered in her ears, but she heard a quiet sound and struggled to identify it. A moment later, she realized he was laughing. 

"So," he panted, chuckling still, lying on his back in the snow and lowering his arms slowly as he realized another hit wasn't coming. "Little Jane _does_ bite. It seems I am truly at your mercy." 

It was hard not to strike him again. Staring down at his face, creased now by that infuriating, mocking smile, she asked the question he'd thus far refused to answer directly. " _Why_ did Thor send you here?" 

The smile died, bit by bit, until his face was nearly expressionless. She could still see the anger though, in the thin, tight line of his mouth. "Fortune favors my brother as she never did me; he guessed my game and exposed to all of Asgard that I was not the Allfather. But not before I had set certain plans in motion. I have been sent here to prevent a war. I, who should have led it!" 

She almost asked who he had intended to war against, but realized an instant later that for Loki, the only conquest that would suffice would be one of universal proportions. Instead, she asked, "Why didn't Thor kill you?" 

"Ah," Loki said, a bitter amusement coating his voice, "I am still alive because without my knowledge the Allfather will remain as he is: lost. But I could not remain on Asgard, not with the threat of war looming so very close. There would be far too many opportunities for me to turn to betrayal again. The magnitude of this war dictates that all of Asgard's warriors be involved. There would be no one left to ensure that I am properly jailed. And so my brother chose the only option he felt open to him. He tore my powers from me and sentenced me to imprisonment here, in the last possible place in the universe that I would prefer to be." 

Jane thought hard on that as Loki slowly got back to his feet, his eyes glued warily to the baton she still held in her gloved hand. It made perfect, dismal sense. In a world that had just started to right itself around her, the man she'd loved had chosen her to act as jailer and caretaker for a traitor, trickster, and murderer. That Thor, whom she had suffered for, yearned for, and needed, would thrust her into a role of this magnitude without asking her first was a crippling insult. What was at stake in this situation was dire and obvious: if Loki were to die, Odin was lost. 

In that moment, she found she hated Thor for putting her in this position. 

Loki was standing again, arms wrapped tight around his chest once more. He was shivering violently. Jane felt, despite everything, a momentary pang of remorse. She quickly subdued it before taking one step in his direction. 

"To be perfectly clear," she said, every word ringing with iron certainty, "I don't want this anymore than you do. I resent it. If circumstances were different, I'd leave you out here to freeze without a second thought. But I won't." 

"Now," she continued even as he opened his mouth, no doubt, to deliver some bitingly sarcastic remark, "you're mortal. Which means, you're as vulnerable and insignificant and puny as I am. Keep that in mind. If you touch me again, if you try to hurt me, I will find a way to get rid of you. I will call S.H.I.E.L.D and let them know you're back on Earth. I'll broadcast your location for all to see. You don't have any friends here. Are we clear?" 

"Perfectly." Infuriatingly, he was smiling again. Bowing slightly, he swept one arm outwards, in the direction of the door to her house. "Shall we?"

 

**.x.**


	3. All Things Uneasy

**_Sol's Notes:_ ** _Again, thank you so much for your support!_

**.3.**

She'd made Loki lead the way to the house. Turning her back to him had never been an option, particularly not after the fact that she'd managed to successfully defend herself from his attack. Granted, he was far weaker than he usually was with his powers stripped from him. She knew that once he became used to this mortal body, however, he wouldn't be so easily subdued.

The full ramifications of the current situation began to hit home, prompting the dull, leaden sensation in the pit of her stomach to intensify. With Loki close, she could never let down her guard. She must always be wary of an attack, a betrayal. Worst of all, she had no idea how long he would be here. What if his banishment dragged on for months? It was becoming very hard to care about how all of this would ultimately affect Asgard. The idea of turning Loki over to S.H.I.E.L.D was more and more appealing every second.

In the house, he'd stood in the small entryway, still shivering, and watched with quiet amusement as she removed her boots and her coat. Throughout it all she maintained a firm hold on the baton, collapsed back to its compact form. Glancing up to see him watching her, she felt her face contort into an expression that stopped just shy of being baleful. He said nothing however, and bent to remove his own footwear as she pulled off her gloves and scarf. She stepped carefully past him into the house proper, striding quickly through the open kitchen and stepping down into the living room. The stove sat on the north wall with the woodbox to the right. A quick glance backwards informed her that Loki was slowly wandering her way, running his hands over his upper arms and looking around at the house. He was limping slightly, favoring one leg. Jane felt more than a little vindictive pleasure at that.

"How very ... quaint."  His voice drifted over to her as he paused to look at some of the artwork adorning her walls, prints by Kinuko Craft that she'd put up in an effort to make the house feel more like a home. Making certain to keep him in her line of sight, she opened the stove and added more wood to the fire which was dancing low about the embers. Almost instantly the fire grew, the flames leaping and casting a welcoming, beckoning glow through the soot-stained pane of glass at the stove's front.

The heat it gave off was impressive; already she felt it easing the chill from her body. Loki, drawn by the promise of warmth had come closer. He dropped to a crouch only inches from the stove, turning his face to the glow. She eyed him uneasily for a long moment, but he seemed wholly concerned with absorbing as much of the heat as he possibly could. Ensuring she had the baton firmly in hand once more, she passed behind him, stepping up into the kitchen. She busied herself with the task of making herself something warm to drink while repeatedly casting glances over her shoulder. Her unwelcome guest had not moved; if anything, it seemed he'd shifted closer to the fireplace.

The water was ready quickly, and once she cradled a mug of hot chocolate in her hands she leaned back against the counter and considered the man kneeling in front of her stove. She didn't want to care that he was cold. She didn't want to care about anything concerning him. _He's a liar_ , she reminded herself grimly. _He's a murderer. He's a traitor_.  But he was also mortal, and the life of Odin and subsequently the welfare of Asgard depended on his well-being.

To say she was conflicted was an understatement of massive proportions. She was having an incredibly difficult time understanding why Thor would send Loki to her. Sending him to S.H.I.E.L.D would have made more sense—he'd be imprisoned, yes, but he'd be safe. Jane suspected that Thor wished to keep Loki's most recent traitorous ambitions—and the resulting strife for Asgard—from the attention of S.H.I.E.L.D. Given how thoroughly visitors from Asgard had shaken up Earth during multiple visits, she didn't really blame Thor from wanting to keep the latest issues hidden. She did, however, blame him for dragging her into the mess without so much as making an appearance in order to ask her.

 Echoing her sombre thoughts, Jane's eyes wandered from the contents of her mug to Loki where he was situated in front of the fire. Even from where she stood, she could still that he was still wracked by the occasional shiver. Sighing, she turned, set her cup down and began to make a drink for him as well.

He looked up at her as she stepped down from the kitchen, mug in hand.  Wordlessly, she held it out to him. His eyes moved from what she offered to her face and then back again. Lips curving upwards in a faint, sardonic smile, he finally reached up to take it from her. Irritated for so many reasons that she couldn't really pinpoint one to dwell on, she turned to make her way back to the kitchen.

His hand on her wrist stopped her, anchoring her where she was, and she rounded on him in alarm—she'd left the baton on the kitchen counter. His gaze, however, was focused on the hand attached to the wrist he'd captured. She knew with a certain kind of despair exactly what he had noticed.

"This did not happen in Asgard. Nor Svartalfheim."

The hand in question, the hand that was missing the smallest and index fingers, twitched as she attempted to wrench free. He didn't relinquish his grip and managed to hold on firmly while still balancing the mug of steaming liquid in the other hand.

"No, it didn't." Her words were an exhale of ire and tension.

"How, then?" He'd moved his gaze upwards and it had centered intently on her face.

She shook her head. "Doesn't matter."

He loosened his grip and she took two steps back instantly. He considered her another moment before turning his attention back to the fire, grasping the mug with both hands and bringing to his mouth. Scowling, shaken, Jane stepped back up into the kitchen to retrieve her own drink.

"You are not as I remember you." His words floated over to her just as she'd taken a sip of her own drink. His back was to her as he knelt in the warm light emanating from the stove. "Missing fingers aside, of course."

"Everyone changes. The last time I saw you, you were still a god."

She'd foolishly hoped to rile him, to nettle him. Instead, her pointed remark was met with a small laugh. He rose to his feet, turning to face her, still holding the cup in his hands. Again he wore that expression, that smile of gently mocking amusement at her expense. "Thor has not seen that injury, has he?"

There was a long pause before she answered. "You know he hasn't."

He dipped his head in agreement to her words. "I suppose I must shoulder some of the blame for that. I did my best to keep him quite busy during my reign. It wouldn't have done to give him too much free time to think about things that could have interfered with my designs. Not," he amended dryly, "that thinking is one of my brother's most notable strengths."

It was hard, so hard, to stand there and listen to all the hurtful, callous things he had a habit of saying without reacting the way she wanted to. The baton sat on the counter beside her. She could still remember how exhilarating it had felt to use it on him. The fact that it had also made her ill from guilt was a memory that faded more and more with every word he said.

"I advised my brother to end this little romance, you know. Mortal lives are fleeting, the life of a candle compared to the life of a star. You are all of you so vulnerable. He was most adamant that he wished to see it through. Even when I devised ways to keep him from returning here, he clung to your memory with admirable devotion."

"Your ... injury," he went on, "how do you think Thor will react once he sees it? Once he realizes that he has failed to protect you as he swore he would? The truth of your mortal vulnerability will strike home. He'll be forced to realize that the two of you are separated by more than just realms."

"I already know this."  Her voice surprised her, even and calm. In her mind there were a thousand thoughts—old and new—reeling about, echoing what he'd said. "I know what I am. I know what he is."

"Then why this reluctance you show towards our present situation?  I assumed you would be eager for an opportunity to aid Thor, even in this manner. And as for your treatment of me thus far ...  if you recall, it was I that saved your life the last time we were in each other's company. Twice. Not to mention the times my brother has so gallantly protected you from harm. Though Thor would never dare mention it, you are indebted to those of Asgard."

Her nostrils flared as she sucked in a deep breath, struggling to control the urge to throw her half full mug across the room, directly at his head. "That debt," she said tersely, "and _any_ debt I have ever owed to you or Thor or Asgard has been repaid. In full."

"Stay here," she said sharply, just as he opened his mouth to deliver some other form of insulting or condescending remark, "Or don't. I don't care. If you stay, you can sleep in the small bedroom down the hall. There's food, if you're hungry. I'm not your cook. I won't clean up after you, either."

Holding her mug so tightly she feared it might break in one hand and grabbing the baton in the other, she walked out of the kitchen and headed down the hall, pausing at the first door on the left that led to her office. She paused and said without turning to look at him, "And stay out of my way," before stepping into the office and turning on the light.

**.x.**

The third of Thor's enemies to find her had been coldly and creatively cruel. Her femininity and mortal vulnerability had not spared her any torture, physical or mental. That enemy had nearly killed her. There had been times, lying broken and bleeding on a cold concrete floor, when she wished it had been so.

This enemy had not come to Earth alone, but had led a small army. For the second time in as many years, New York had been the epicentre for battles more alien than human in nature. Jane had not been the only hostage. And if she hadn't known Thor, hadn't loved Thor, she wouldn't have suffered as much.  It was his love for her that made it so bad—if he'd simply dismissed her as easily as Loki had advised, she would have been useless. But Thor had truly cared for her and so she had became someone useful, became a valuable pawn in a game meant to inflict only pain and devastation.

It did not go according to plan. The third enemy had hoped to lure Thor to Earth by hurting Jane. But Thor had been fighting other battles—as had Heimdall, she later surmised. She had to think that because she couldn't bear to think that she had endured what she had with Thor being aware of it all … and choosing not to come.

The earthbound members of the Avengers had been the ones to eradicate this enemy. The victory did not come without a cost. Erik Selvig, kidnapped along with Jane simply because he'd had the misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, had died. Hundreds of others had died as well, collateral damage. And by the time she was found, Jane had nearly been dead too.

It had not been Thor to carry her out of the wreckage of the building where she and others had been held captive. It had been the Hulk.  The massive, terrifying creature fueled by rage and hatred and every other negative emotion had found her bleeding and barely conscious amidst great chunks of rubble after the enemy had been defeated and the invading army routed.  Carefully, gently, the Hulk had shifted fallen slabs of concrete out of the way and carefully, gently, he had picked Jane up, raising her into his arms.

From that point on, full memory escaped her. She recalled some of it in tattered, hazy bits. She remembered hearing Fury's voice, insisting the Hulk focus more on savaging the remnants of the enemy army and less on saving her life. _We'll fly her out_ , Fury had said. _We'll call medics_. The Hulk had ignored the order. He'd also ignored Tony Stark's offer to take her and fly her to the nearest hospital. The enormous green creature that everyone was so afraid of had clutched her close in a tight yet tender hold and had bounded into the air, clearing several city blocks in one leap. And once he'd plummeted to his destination, he had gently delivered Jane Foster into the capable and awestruck hands of the hospital's staff that had gathered outside.

Later, when the surgeries were over and her injuries on the mend, she remembered drifting out of merciful sleep to find Bruce Banner sitting in the chair across from her hospital bed. When she'd managed to reconstruct the recent chain of events while fighting off painkiller haziness, she thanked him in a weak, wavering voice. His soft voice and kind eyes as he replied had broken through the last tenuous defense she had, and she'd wept. And Bruce Banner, pulling his chair up close, had clasped the fingers of her good hand with his own and held on tight while she fell apart.

"You don't owe him anything," he'd told her a couple days later. He'd been a frequent visitor during her recuperation, bringing her flowers one day and newspapers and magazines to read the next. Now, sitting in the same chair, leaning back with his legs outstretched, he'd regarded her with his solemn dark eyes from behind the lenses of his glasses.

"I mean that, Jane. You don't owe Thor anything. Not after this. He should have been here. He should have been the one to pull you out of that building."

"But he wasn't," she said softly, hating the way the words twisted her up inside.

Bruce shook his head. "He wasn't. I don't know what's going on up there in Asgard. He could be fighting dragons or giants or other gods, I don't know. But Jane—this relationship you've got going with him ... if he's not going to be here when you need him, it's going to get you killed."

"I know," she whispered, fighting the burning threat of tears and the painful knot in her throat.

"I'm not trying to be a jerk. I'm worried, very worried, for your safety. You almost died. If I—if the Other Guy hadn't found you when he did ..."

"I know, thank you, thank you so much for what you did—"

"Jane." Bruce had paused and sighed, running a hand through his already messy hair in distressed frustration. "I'm telling you this because something has to change. Thor's been AWOL the last two times you've been in trouble and that is not a good sign. Something has to be done. You need to change your name and move or go into some kind of protective custody with S.H.I.E.L.D. You need to be very, very careful from now on."

He was leaning forward, elbows on his knees and hands clasped together. On his face she could read his earnest concern for her and it tore her up on the inside to know that he cared as much as he did. He was a kind man, a gentle man, despite his ferocious alter-ego. Staring into his eyes as he entreated her to go into hiding, she found herself wishing she'd met him years ago, before she'd stumbled across Thor and lost her heart on a careless whim.

Weeks later, when she was finally release, she'd taken Bruce Banner's advice to heart. She began to set a plan into motion. Something had changed within her. Something had needed to change.

The Jane that left the hospital was not the same Jane that had entered it.

 **.x.**  

It turned out she worked well under stress.

Sequestered away in her office, she'd been easily able to lose herself in the research she'd started shortly after the fall of Malekith, research S.H.I.E.L.D had expressed avid interest in. Her mind wanted a distraction and was ready to focus on familiar territory. She'd still been completely aware that Loki was in her house, but concentrating on her work took a little of that edge off. The desk was situated so that she faced the door, which made it easier to concentrate knowing she could see him coming. The baton, which she now regarded as something of a necessity, was on the desk next to the printer.

When she finally looked up from the screen, rolling her head back and forth to ease the tension in her neck, she was almost  surprised to see that night had fallen. Outside the small window in the bedroom-turned-office was the heavy, unrelenting darkness of a moonless winter night. Sighing, Jane saved her work and closed her laptop. Standing, she grabbed the baton and made for the door.

The rest of the house was dark, and she paused warily before stepping out into the dark hall. She'd been alert to any sounds coming from the living room and heard, twice, the sound of Loki adding more wood to the fire. It was beyond strange, the thought of a creature such as Loki stoking the fire in her living room. She shook her head slightly, amending that thought. _Everything_ was strange now.

The only light in the house, aside from that in the office, was the orange glow of the fire through the soot-stained glass pane in the stove. She could make out the silhouette of Loki, still situated in front of the fire.  Jane moved down the hall and out into the kitchen, flicking the lights on as she went. As the lights in the living room came on, Loki half-turned his head in her direction but made no sound. He was seated, cross-legged, on the floor. The heavy polar fleece blanket that was usually folded across the back of her couch was draped over his shoulders.

Jane frowned. He was so close to the fire that he had to be sweating. They'd been indoors for hours now. He should be more than warm. Feeling a twinge of concern and hating it, she stepped down into the living room and approached him. "Are you still cold?"

"I find that I have a newfound appreciation for your Midgard winters. Even time spent in the remotest reaches of Jotunheim did not affect me thus."

His voice was low and soft. Jane's frown deepened. That he'd caught a chill was obvious. Mortal now as he was, his body was as vulnerable as hers. And yes, she'd been out in the cold too, but she'd been appropriately attired. Fighting off remorse as she remembered him lying in the snow below her, arms raised to fend off her blows, she said simply, "I'll be right back."

She retraced her steps heading out of the living room and moving back down the hall, entering the first door on the right. Flicking on the light in the bathroom, she moved to the large square bathtub in the furthest corner, plugged the drain, and began to run the water. With her fingers held in the stream to gauge the temperature, she cast a glance around. The house was small—three bedroom, one bath—but was nearly new. All appliances and fixtures were nearly new, as well. After living as long as she had in cheap, tiny apartments, she'd quickly learned to love the open concept of her new home. The bathroom in particular had delighted her. The large tub, situated as it was in the corner, was raised slightly above floor level and was accessible by three stairs. In the corner across from the tub was a door-less walk in shower, set within a tiled alcove. A vanity with two sinks shared the same wall as the doorway, with the toilet being in the other corner.

Once the water had reached a temperature that was almost uncomfortably hot, she withdrew her fingers, shaking them free of excess moisture. At the bathroom door she paused, considering. She didn't like any part of Loki being here. She really didn't cherish the idea of him soaking in her tub. On top of that, he had nothing else to wear other than what he'd been cast down to Earth clothed in. She had a temporary solution to that particular problem, although it presented a malicious kind of irony that tightened her stomach into knots. She blew out a frustrated breath. The truth was she didn't have much of a choice in any of this. Loki's well-being was paramount as far as the future Asgard was concerned. And, regrettably, she found she didn’t want to be responsible for even more trouble and strife in Thor's home realm.  

Further down the hall, the second door on the left was her bedroom. Turning the light on, she crossed the carpeted floor to her closet. There, in the very farthest corner, hung an oversized man's terrycloth robe. It was dark blue. Pulling it off the hanger, Jane clutched it tight for a long moment, vividly recalling the times that Erik would come to visit her and Darcy and appear in the mornings in this very same robe, hair in sleepy disarray as he clutched his morning cup of coffee. She almost put it back in the closet until she bitterly reminded herself that the only alternative was to have Loki roam around her house clad only in a towel. She had enough distractions as it was.

She left her room and ducked into the bathroom to check on the tub. It was nearly half full. She laid the robe down on the vanity and headed back out to the living room. It didn't look as though Loki had moved. Coming to a halt at his side, she said, "There's a bath running. Should get you warm."

The look he slanted her was one of mingled contempt and amusement. She cut him off before he could say anything. "Or, you can stay here and be cold all night. It's your call."

"For a nursemaid, your bedside manner is somewhat lacking."

Anger blazed up within her. As he rose to his feet, carelessly discarding the blanket so that it fell to the floor in a heap, she stepped up to him. "Really? Tell me, Loki, where would you be right now if not for me?

"Most likely still out in the snow." He waved a hand dismissively in the direction of the door to the house. "Though I would thankfully be without the impressive array of bruises you've given me."

Jane made a strangled noise of helpless ire. One corner of his mouth quirked upwards at the sound, but he said only, "Lead on." 

Jane tried to ignore the fact that it sounded very much like the order he'd give a servant. She shook her head. "You first."

His smile grew, but he said nothing, merely nodded once before moving away from the fire. She followed him from the living room, down the hall, and into the bathroom. He crossed to the tub and glanced down into it before letting his gaze scan the rest of the room.

"Towels." Jane said curtly, pointing at the rack hanging next to the tub. "When you're done, you can put that on." She pointed then to the robe on the vanity. "It's warmer than what you're wearing."

He'd crossed to the vanity, picking up the robe for closer examination. "A man's robe. This is not, I trust, something my brother has worn during one of his visits?"

"No."

His eyebrows shot upwards. "Another man's, then? Who does it belong to?"

"It belonged," she said in a voice that came out strangled despite her best efforts, "to Erik."

"Ah! Doctor Selvig! As far as mortals go, his mind was most intriguing, a trove of scientific discoveries. Tell me, how is he? Has he recovered fully from our ... alliance?"

"He's dead."

"Regrettable. He was a mortal of true intelligence. A rarity."

For a moment she stared at him, incapable of moving for the strength of desires that swirled through her. The desire to claw his eyes out. The desire to slap him until she drew blood. The desire to bash his head into the tiled green floor until his skull cracked. His eyes were on her face. She knew he was likely very aware of everything she wanted to do to him in that moment.

Reigning in the fury that she felt at that moment was one of the hardest things she had ever done. She forced it down, swallowed hard, and moved to the vanity. Opening a drawer, she rummaged around until she found a bar of soap. She somehow doubted he'd be interested in her bottles of floral and fruit scented body wash lining the tiled surface around the tub. As she straightened, she inhaled sharply. Loki stood directly before her, his long nimble fingers working at the fastenings of his clothing. She found herself staring straight at the exposed expanse of his lean, pale chest.

With a smile that was perfectly calculated to be devastatingly charming with a mocking edge, he asked, "Would you care to help me disrobe, nursemaid?"

Jane felt her face flush several different shades of red in the span of a heartbeat. She felt embarrassment, yes, but mostly a very warranted urge to stab him with something. So lost in the wash of emotions was she that she did not respond at all. Her expressive face gave way as always to what she was experiencing and Loki read it all.

"At a loss for words? Surely I'm not the only male to have made that offer. Surely you and Thor ...?"

Mutely, she backed away, hurling the bar of soap at him. He caught it with ease and advanced on her a step, his head to the side as he considered her with one eyebrow raised in unwelcome speculation.

"Your room," she said tightly after a long minute, having mastered her emotions enough to meet his eyes squarely, "is up the hall, on the right."

She turned and exited the bathroom, closing the door behind her. The sound of his laughter followed her out. She stood where she was for a long span of seconds, breathing deep and fighting hard to regain the calm numbness that had served her so well throughout most of this trial. When she felt the color in her cheeks recede she began to move, heading out into rest of the house. She locked the front door and turned out the lights in the kitchen before moving to the stove. She stocked it full of wood and turned down the damper, ensuring it would burn slowly for the duration of the night. She shut the lights off and moved down the hall. She stopped at the guest bedroom, reaching into to turn on the light before entering her own room. Once inside, she closed the door quietly and locked it.

She turned off the light and felt her way through the dark to her bed. Lying down on her side, still clothed with the baton still held tightly in her good hand, she kept her eyes fastened on the door and wondered how she'd ever be able to sleep.

 

**.x.**


	4. This Mortal Coil

**.4.**

 Sleep came eventually. Surprisingly, there were no dreams. Unsurprisingly, her sleep was fitful. She awoke as the first of the sun's light crept into bedroom. She'd forgotten to close the blinds. The sun's early morning presence as it slowly encompassed her bedroom was ominously hesitant. Jane lay in bed for a long while before rising, thinking about all that had transpired in the last 24 hours. When it became clear that thinking wasn't going to fix anything, she sighed and rolled out of bed. 

Still clothed as she was from the day before, she left her room carefully, quietly. She paused on the threshold. The door to the guest bedroom directly across from hers was open just as she'd left it the night before. She hesitated before stepping across the hall. Had Loki left? Was he elsewhere in the house, lurking? 

Mustering courage, she stuck her head into the other bedroom. Loki was there, lying on his side with his back to the door. Jane watched him for a long moment, trying to discern if he was actually slumbering. His ribs rose and fell in what she perceived as a sleeper's deep rhythm, however, and so she quietly backed out.

The living room and kitchen were flooded with sunlight as the windows in the east wall were large and the curtains open. Jane padded across the laminate floor, heading for the stove. The fire was nearly dead. She added some kindling, waited patiently while they caught, and then added the last three pieces of wood remaining in the woodbox. Once the fire had grown to a healthy size she closed it in.

From there she moved to the entryway. Outside, her morning chores awaited: cutting wood, shovelling snow if needed, and walking down the driveway to check the mailbox. She suited up with practiced ease, donning insulated pants over those she already wore, two jackets, two pairs of gloves, a scarf and a fur-lined hat. She paused with her hand on the doorknob, wondering if it wise to leave Loki unattended in her house. The fact was she really had no choice. Loki was here. She'd chosen to grant him shelter. And the world kept on turning.

 **.x.**  

She made herself a simple breakfast after returning from outdoors. It was simple, two pieces of toast slathered with honey and sprinkled with cinnamon. As she ate at the small circular table in the corner of her kitchen she skimmed her mail for anything of interest, keeping one eye out for Loki's appearance. When she'd finished she cleaned her dishes, putting everything away, before heading down the hall again to grab a change of clothes and then a shower.

Clean, fed, and awake, Jane pondered what to do next. She needed to make a grocery run into Woodrill; she would have had to have done so soon anyways, but the fact that Loki was now here increased the need. In town she could grab him some clothing, too. He couldn't keep wearing his original garb and she didn't want him wearing Erik's robe. However, she didn't relish the idea of taking him to town with her. She wanted as little to do with him as possible though it seemed the chances of that were slim to none while they were inhabiting the same house.

She waited around for him to rise, occupying herself by reading the local newspaper front to back while seated on the couch in the living room. She'd turned the TV on for background noise, keeping it low. Finally, after glancing at the digital clock on the front of the satellite receiver and finding that it was nearly noon, she set the paper down, steeled herself, and went to wake up her unwelcome guest.

He'd turned in his sleep and was now on his side facing the door. He was sleeping still. Jane hesitated, wavering between the desire to rouse him and the desire to passionately not care. She was still fighting with indecision when she noticed his eyes were actually open as mere slits.

"You're awake?"

"So it would seem."

His voice was low and hoarse. He shifted into a sitting position, passing a hand over his face, brushing back the stray, ink black strands of his hair that had fallen forward. Something about his movements seemed off. They were slow, sluggish, as though everything about his body was unfamiliar still. Which, she supposed, was entirely understandable given what had happened to him.

"Are you alright?"

"... I am not entirely certain."

Jane frowned. That didn't sound normal for Loki. She crossed the room and hesitated only for a moment before reaching out and placing the back of her hand against his forehead. As she suspected, it was hotter than it should be. This close she could see that his face was flushed as well.

"I cannot tell illness from inherent mortal frailty. There is a persistent fog in my head. There is a burgeoning ache between my eyes. And I cannot swallow without pain. All of these afflictions conspired to keep me awake for much of the night." He listed off his symptoms in a voice that could have been plaintive if not for the undertone of disdain and arrogance.

 _Goddamnit_. Loki, the god of mischief, an immortal from another realm, had caught the common cold. At least she hoped it was just a cold. If it was anything worse…

She took her hand away. He shifted his position, leaning his head against the headboard and smiling up at her with lazy insolence. He still wore Erik's robe, which bothered her a great deal. She forced herself to remember that it would have been worse if he'd gone to bed naked. Either way, she was disconcertingly aware of the fact that the robe had parted, confronting her with same view of his chest as she'd been exposed to the evening before.

As though aware of her annoyance and thoroughly enjoying it—both, she suspected, being true—he spoke. "Will I live, nursemaid?"

She blew a breath out slowly, considering what to do next. Being as Loki was newly mortal, did his body lack the immunities that most other humans had? Was this just a run-of-the-mill virus or was it worse? She had no way of knowing the answers, not without taking him to a doctor. That in itself presented another difficulty. Once he was beyond the walls of this house, in public, there was always the chance that someone would recognize him from what he'd done in New York—even in a place as remote as this. She stared down at him with a slight scowl while she debated what to do.

"Your extended silence is not exactly reassuring."

"You'll be fine," she snapped, irritation surging at his words. His smile grew wider in response. Shaking her head, she turned and left the room. She returned a few minutes later after having rummaged through the medicine cabinet in the bathroom, carrying a mostly full bottle of Nyquil.

"What precisely is that?" He asked as she took off the cap and poured out an adult dose.

"You'll feel better." She carefully held the small cap out to him. "It'll make you sleep."

With one eyebrow raised, he took it from her. "Sedating me? A rather ineffectual fix, is it not?"

She graced him with a wide, insincere smile. "You don't need to take it. If you want to suffer, that's fine by me."

He laughed, a soft, tired exhale. "I'm sure it is." Keeping his eyes on her, he downed the contents, his face contorting as the taste flooded his mouth.

"That," he rasped, handing the cap back, "was horrid."

Jane's only reply was another vindictive smile.

He settled down onto the bed again, resting his head on the pillows and pulling the blankets back over his body. "And while I slumber, unaware and helpless, what will you be doing?"

"Trying very hard," she said over her shoulder as she left the room, "to convince myself not to smother you."

**.x.**

It didn't take long for the Nyquil to work its particular brand of magic. Jane checked on Loki fifteen minutes later. He slept on his back, his head facing the door. She scrutinized him for a long minute, a frown furrowing her brow. It seemed somewhat cliché, the thoughts she was thinking in that moment: that he looked completely and utterly at peace, innocent somehow of everything she knew he'd done and was capable of. In repose Loki was just a man, not some god-turned-mortal, not a criminal exiled from another realm for his crimes. As she watched, he inhaled deeply, his head rolling to the other side.

Her frown deepened. He wasn't innocent. He wasn't a man. Repeating those thoughts over and over in a protective mantra, she left the room.

**.x.**

Knowing Loki slept and would likely sleep for some hours yet, Jane felt safe in leaving him alone in her house. She drove into Woodrill. The roads were clear; she'd seen evidence that the grader had been by her house when she'd walked to get the mail that morning, and the highways themselves had been freshly salted and plowed. The day was absolutely clear, not a trace of a cloud in the sky, and the sun's reflection off the snow was so bright as to be painful. Jane donned the pair of sunglasses that hung on the passenger side sun visor so that she could drive in peace.

Traffic in and around Woodrill was heavier than expected for a smaller community, but Jane knew that a majority of it stemmed from the flurry of oilfield activity taking place locally. Most of the vehicles she encountered on the highway were directly related to the oilfield: tanker trucks, field trucks, and large convoys of huge trucks moving pieces of rig equipment. Jane was used to the traffic by now and had learned to drive cautiously. When first she'd moved to the area, every drive had been a white-knuckle one.

The town of Woodrill was firmly in the grips of winter. Even though it was a few weeks away, Christmas decorations of silver, gold, red and green hung from every light post. As she drove through town she took note of the signs and displays all directed to the holiday season. An unsettling wave of homesickness overtook her; she'd never spent a Christmas alone. She'd always had her mother, Erik, or Darcy to share the holiday with. This year it would be much, much different. Jane squared her jaw, forcing down that thought and the way it made her feel. She'd come here to be safe and to keep those close to her safe. Nothing else mattered.

**.x.**

She made only a couple stops. First she'd gone to Wal-Mart in order to see about finding something suitable for Loki to wear that wasn't as outlandish as what he'd arrived in. There wasn't a lot in the way of clothing stores in Woodrill and Wal-Mart was convenient and cheap. Within, she grabbed casual men's wear, amusing herself by thinking of Loki's inevitable distaste when he laid eyes on her purchases. She guessed his size—he wasn't a big man but he was lean and tall. Socks she bought in bulk. Confronted by the quandary of boxers, briefs, or boxer-briefs she paused and scowled as she surveyed the wall-mounted merchandise. Eventually she chose the last.

After Wal-Mart she headed for Mark's, a store which offered regular clothing but also had a large inventory of outdoor gear. Loki couldn't spend his entire exile living in her house; he'd have to go outside at some point. With that thought in mind she asked one of the store clerks, a tall and lean young man who blushed endearingly as Jane spoke, to try on winter coats. She chose one that was warm, practical, and affordable. When it came time to buy boots, she grabbed the kind that seemed to be the universal Canadian preference—felt-lined, knee-high, rubber footed—in three different sizes. Explaining to the clerk that she had an unexpected guest and wasn't aware of his shoe size, she managed to persuade him into agreeing to let her return the pairs that didn't fit for a full refund. Before she left Mark's she grabbed man's gloves, one pair thin and the other thick and insulated. The final checkout price made her wince, but she'd expected it. Outdoor winter gear was not cheap regardless of where you shopped.

Her last stop in Woodrill was for groceries. She tried to be more discerning here. Loki didn't seem like the type who'd enjoy living on frozen dinners. She wasn't, either, truth be told. She'd never been much of a cook until she'd moved here. Living this far from fast food chains, delivery, and takeout had prompted her to learn. Her grocery bill was nearly equal to what she'd paid for the clothing but she had enough to last for a few weeks, or so she hoped. After loading everything into her truck, she made one last stop before leaving town.

Before moving, she'd only heard references once or twice to Canadians and their love of Tim Horton's, a coffee-and-donut chain. After moving, she'd been driven by simple curiosity to sample their wares. After tasting her first mint chocolate iced cappuccino, she'd willingly been converted to the ranks of "Timmy's" fans. It had become ritual to grab such a beverage—an iced capp—every time she came into town.

She left Woodrill feeling oddly more settled than she had in the past two days. She'd finally come to terms—she hoped—with the situation with Loki. She couldn't do anything but try to adapt and she knew from experience that she could adapt well if she absolutely had to. It seemed intolerable and in many ways it was, but she could do it. She knew that, at the end of Loki's exile, she'd be seeing Thor again. She still wasn't sure how she felt about that or felt about him, for that matter, but she was ready for it to happen. New Jane needed to deal with the remnants of the life that had driven her here. She needed to come to terms with and move on past everything that had happened. Once she could, old Jane and new Jane could finally be reconciled. And that was something she wanted very badly.

**.x.**

Loki was still sleeping when she got home. She checked in on him first before she set about unpacking everything she'd purchased. The men's clothing she carried quietly into the guest bedroom, setting it on the dresser in plain sight where it couldn't be missed. Loki didn't stir as she moved about, lying on his side facing away from the door.

It was nearing dinner time and Jane was hungry—her iced capp hadn't really done anything for her appetite. She opened the fridge to consider its new contents, pondering what to make. She wanted something warm and filling. She'd become familiar with a number of recipes since moving, some of which she could now make entirely from memory. It was one such recipe she opted for now, and having reached her decision, began pulling what she needed from the pantry and the fridge.

**.x.**

In her opinion, she'd perfected beef stew. The finished product was, in a word, hearty. Thick chunks of beef—cooked to tenderness and nearly falling apart—were mixed with hunks of red potatoes, onions, carrots, mushrooms, and peas in a heavy base seasoned with beef and chicken stock. Her kitchen had been flooded by the wonderful smell, redolent of bay leaves, meat, and vegetables. Her hunger had steadily increased as she'd worked and for the final two hours it took for the stew to cook she went into her office and did some work in order to try and take her mind off food.

When it was finally ready, she gave herself a generous portion in a bowl and slid into a chair at the kitchen table. She'd just taken the first mouthful when Loki rounded the corner and entered the room.

He looked, in a word, dazed. He was running a hand through the dark mass of his hair which sleep had mussed into disarray. He had the flushed cheeks and glassy eyes of someone in the grips of a bad head cold. She suspected he was still feeling some of the effects of the Nyquil dose as well. He'd donned some of the clothes she'd left him—dark jeans, navy zip-up hooded sweater, socks—all of which seemed to more or less fit.

"Feeling better?" She asked as he blinked several times as though to clear his head of the fog.

"I feel," he said in a voice that was husky from sleep and illness, "less than alive. Sub-human."

"It'll pass. There's food there, if you're hungry."

"Jane Foster is not my cook. I was made aware of this."

"Sometimes exceptions are made," she said before taking another mouthful of food.

"Indeed." He drifted closer to the large pot on the stove, reaching out and lifting the lid to peer at what was inside. "This smells ... palatable."

"Bowls are in the cupboard next to the fridge," she said, indicating with her empty spoon. "Utensils in the drawer to your left. If you're certain you want to eat, that is."

He half-turned to face her. "Why would I not?"

"There's always the risk of poison."

A reluctant smile flickered about his lips. "I shall have to take my chances. I have not eaten since ..."

He trailed off and Jane knew exactly where his thoughts had gone. To forestall a lapse into one of his nastier moods, she went on talking, "Everything fits okay? The clothes?"

He began moving, grabbing himself a bowl and a spoon as she had directed him too. "Yes. Though I question your taste."

"Nowhere nearby to buy tailored suits." Her reply was lightly and completely unapologetic.

"That is regrettable. Wearing these I feel somewhat less than—"

"Arrogant? Overbearing? Villainous?"

Full bowl in hand, he moved to the table and took the chair opposite her own. "—less than myself," he finished, ignoring her interruption completely.

He began to eat as well and for a time they were both silent. Jane pondered, as she chewed, savored, and swallowed every mouthful of her dinner, at the almost-but-not-quite air of companionship that had unexpectedly manifested itself between them. She suspected a great deal of it had to do with his being sick. It had dulled the edge of his intrinsic cruelty, dampened his instinct to insult in all the subtlest of ways. Or perhaps, she was forced to realize, this was just another game. Thor had emphasized the nature of Loki as a trickster. What better way to inflict the most grievous hurts than to attack when all defenses were down?

But Jane was not a fool. Not anymore. And she was going to make a point of being on guard at all times to avoid stumbling directly into any verbal traps he had devised.

She finished her meal before he finished his. She stood, carrying her dishes to the counter where a sink full of dishwater waited. She moved the pot of stew to a back burner; it needed to cool before she could put it away. Leaving Loki to his meal, she stepped down into the living room in order to check on the fire but was intercepted by the ringing of the phone.

The cordless receiver lay on the end table next to the couch. She grabbed it, thumbing the button. "Hello?"

"Jane," said a male voice, and for a moment she grappled with confusion, not recognizing it. A moment later recognition clicked and she found herself smiling warmly.

"Bruce!" 

She immediately heard the sound of Loki turning in his chair. Belatedly, she remembered that Loki was all too familiar with Bruce Banner's alter ego, which meant that he was likely familiar with the man himself. Jane began heading to her office, glancing into the kitchen. Loki was twisted around in his seat, focused on her with laser intensity. She knew what he was thinking—Bruce was a part of the Avengers, part of S.H.I.E.L.D. … would she surrender Loki to them?

"I'm ... doing well. Better than well, actually," she said as she walked, replying to Bruce's question. As she walked down the hall to the office, she allowed herself a small smile. Let Loki wonder. Let him fret. It was nice for once to have the upper hand.

 **.x.**  

"How are you really?"

"I'm fine, Bruce. I promise." She tried hard to convey a sense of normalcy in her words. Even though she'd only known him for a short time, it hadn't taken long to realize that Bruce was a highly, deeply perceptive person.

"You sound ... strained."

"Do I?" Jane worked on controlling her tone until it was calm, conversational. "I've been feeling under the weather a little."

Concern sharpened Bruce's tone. "Anything serious?"

"A head cold. I'm recovering. The common cold is a lot more common in the frozen north."

He laughed. "I can imagine. How did you settle in? Still missing home?"

"Sometimes," she admitted, thinking back to the wave of bittersweet nostalgia that had battered her earlier in the day as she'd been driving through town. "For the most part, I'm okay with it. This is starting to feel like home now."

They bantered this way, chatter between friends. He asked her about her research and any advances she'd made. She responded in kind by asking about his. Bruce had called her every now and then after she'd first moved here to check in. It was beyond reassuring to know he cared that much despite that they were relatively new to each other as friends. He was the only one from her old life she still talked to. Darcy wasn't permitted to know where Jane had gone or to know any of her contact info—S.H.I.E.L.D considered her a risk in regards to a security leak. Jane needed to remain hidden and anonymous in order to stay out of danger. Darcy, reluctantly, had agreed to all stipulations. The day Jane had left she'd cried hard, hugging her friend tightly. Jane had cried too, and returned the embrace just as tightly.

As they talked, the homesickness she'd experienced before returned; not a longing for a particular place, but for the people she'd been close to. She missed Darcy. She missed Erik too, so much that the thought of him physically hurt. She missed Bruce and the long hours they'd spent visiting while she was in the hospital. In some ways, she missed her old life.

But in other ways, the ways crucial to her survival, she didn't.

Jane and Bruce talked for almost an hour. When she returned the phone to its stand in the living room, Loki was seated on the couch, blanket wrapped around his shoulders, reading the local newspaper. "Don't worry," she said sweetly as he glanced up at her, "I didn't turn you in."

Eyes narrowing, he turned his attention back to the newspaper.

After ensuring the stove was full of wood, Jane headed back to her office. She was well-fed and feeling surprisingly upbeat after her talk with Bruce. It seemed like a good time to be productive.

 **.x.**  

She'd drifted off at some point. Her eyes had been burning and she'd taken a break from reading words and graphs and numbers on the screen, leaning her head back against her chair. And then she'd made the mistake of closing her eyes.

A shadow was what woke her, something blocking out the light from overhead. Startled, her eyes snapped open and she gasped. Loki was there.

"What are you—"

She tried to stand. His hands on the arms of her chair stopped her from doing so. He looked the same as he had earlier, dazed and out of focus. She waited for him to say something, heart pounding from being startled awake.

When he did speak, it wasn't at all what she had expected. "What have you been working on, secluded away in this little room?"

Jane blinked. Her alarm began to recede. That he was feeling very unlike himself was apparent. She almost felt sorry for him—newly mortal, exiled, and now suffering from illness. He turned to look at her laptop screen where she'd been working on explaining her theories by way of numerous and extensive calculations.

"Loki ..." His face was still flushed and his eyes had a faraway look to them. _He's still feverish_ , she realized with a frown. He returned his gaze to her face, eyebrows raised as he waited to hear the rest of what she had to say.

Instead, she reached up and laid the back of her hand against his forehead again. And again, his flesh was unnaturally warm. When she took her hand away he was still watching her in silence.

"Go to bed," she said softly, trying and failing to feel anything but pity for the poor little exiled prince.

 _Murderous prince_ , her brain reminded her. _Traitorous prince_.

"I left the Nyquil in your room. Take some. It'll help you sleep all night."

He sighed, closing his eyes. When he opened them again they sought her own. "Jane. What is it my brother sees?"

"I don't—"

"In you." His interruption was impatient, perplexed. Comprehension dawned on what exactly he was referring too and she felt her stomach drop in a very unsettling way.

"Is it," he went on, leaning in closer, "something I might see? In time?"

This was not a conversation she wanted to have now. It wasn't a conversation she wanted to have, _ever_. This close, however, it was impossible not to see him for what he was, not to notice the particular glacial shade of his eyes or the impressive bone structure that alluded to his deific ancestry.

With him this close, it was getting very hard to breathe.

One of his hands lifted from the chair, the fingers curling in loosely. The backs of his knuckles ghosted over the line of her cheek and down the column of her neck. Jane sucked in a silent breath of panicked disbelief. He wasn't in his right mind. He was feverish. If he'd been feeling normal, the only way he'd want to touch her would be to strangle her.

 _Take control, Jane_. "Go to bed, Loki," she repeated in a voice that shook slightly.

His smile was slight, one of wearied self-deprecation. His hand fell away. "A nursemaid's recommendation?"

Wordlessly, she nodded.

He straightened and stepped away. Gazed down at her, a faint frown marring the skin between his brows. Shook his head with an air of mild bewilderment. And finally, thankfully, left the room.

Jane's breath left her in a long, rapid rush. She dropped her head into her hands and wondered how she could have ever been so foolish to think that this would get any easier.

**.x.**


	5. Hard Questions

**_Sol’s Notes:_ ** _I apologize for the delay between chapters. Thank you again for all the support!_

**.5.**

Jane somehow slept that night.

In the morning, she resolved not to think of what Loki had said. She resolved not to think of the way he’d touched her. She resolved not to remember the way that, as he had asked her that oh-so-unwelcome question, his pale eyes had darkened with something terrifying, something oddly compelling. She forced herself to forget the way the veneer of an arrogant, exiled prince had given way to a stranger lying concealed beneath. And she tried so very, very hard to banish the memory of the emotions she’d felt in those tense, suspended moments—

Of them all, fear was not the greatest. Curiosity was, a wisp of odd, frayed longing that had unraveled so very quickly in light of everything else. But she’d felt it all the same.

That particular recollection, Jane knew, had the power to undo her. So she shuttled it away and locked it up tight in the furthest recesses of her mind. In time it would fade just like every other awful, unwanted memory she had.

She prayed that would be fast enough.

**.x.**

Loki was still sick, though it seemed he had slept. She’d heard his quiet coughs in the late hours as she willed her mind to rest. He was far more familiar to her that morning than he had been the night previous, greeting her with thinly veiled contempt. He was cold. He was mocking. He was normal, and she was absurdly grateful for it.

He helped himself to food throughout the day. The rest he spent sleeping. On her way to her own room at one point, she glanced into the guest room to see Loki asleep on his back. A book lay open on his chest. Jane paused in the door, torn between surprise and irritation.

She hadn’t given him permission to take books from her small library in the living room. She had always loved to read. Life before her relocation here had often been far too hectic to allow for reading as a pastime. Besides, she’d had her work to keep her occupied. After changing her name and moving north, however, she’d found she had an abundance of time on her hands. She still worked, yes, but not the way she used to. The theories and equations that had so transfixed her thoughts in the years prior had soured somehow. She could still appreciate the beauty of astrophysics. But she knew now that behind its magic lay things better left undisturbed. She’d begun accumulating books after the move, ordering them online or buying them wherever she could find them in Woodrill. They allowed her an escape from dark thoughts that haunted her still. They were a reprieve, and seeing Loki with one of them irked her. Ending her contemplation, she shook her head and moved past the door to his room. Let him read. It kept him busy and out of her way.

She was mildly surprised when, later on that evening, she emerged from her office to find the kitchen clean. She knew Loki had eaten; she’d heard him moving about in the kitchen. That he cleaned up after himself was both surprising and disconcerting. Like almost everything else to do with him, she stopped thinking about it. Instead she opened the fridge and brought out a container of leftovers. A small, quiet cough and movement from the corner of her eye caught her attention and she looked up to see Loki seated on the couch in the living room, head bent over the book in his lap. She considered him for a moment before shrugging and going about heating her dinner.

**.x.**

Days passed. Loki and Jane settled into an uneasy routine. When he’d fully recovered from his illness he began rising before she did. In the mornings she would find him either seated at her kitchen table or before the fire. Always he was reading. She had no idea what book it was that had caught his attention until one morning when he’d glanced up at her as she entered the room. That in itself was somewhat unusual; he’d become very adept at pretending she didn’t exist at all. Jane wasn’t entirely sure which Loki she preferred—the confrontational, needling one that had first arrived here or the coldly indifferent one that had come into creation after that night in her office.

She met his glance with one of her own. “Morning,” she muttered, knowing she’d be met with silence as she had every other morning for some time now.

Loki inclined his head in mute greeting. As she went about making her morning drink—a cup of strong orange rooibos tea with a teaspoon of honey mixed in—she became increasingly aware of the fact that he was watching her. Unnerved by his silent observation, she stirred the honey into her tea with more force than was needed, the spoon clanging against the cup. She finally turned to look at him, snapping, “Yes?”

Her obvious ire prompted him to smile. Her eyes narrowed. Huffing out a sigh, she grabbed her cup and began to turn.

“I expected your library to house only the most trivial pieces of literature. I will admit I was wrong.”

Jane closed her eyes for a moment, hating the way he always waited to speak until she was on the verge of leaving a room. Slowly turning back around, she raised an eyebrow in question.

“This,” he told her, turning the book he’d been reading around and shoving it across the table in her direction, “is proving to be a most intriguing read.”

Jane’s eyes dropped to the book title, her brows shooting up in recognition. “Tigana.”

“To be written by a mortal it is most impressive, considering the intrinsic limitations of imagination and comprehension of the human mind.”

“It’s fiction,” Jane said, the conversation feeling more than a little surreal to her. “Fantasy.”

“Yes.”

Jane stared at him, inexplicably perplexed. Loki did not discuss fantasy novels. Loki did not read fantasy novels.

“There are characters within this story that I admire—”

“Alberico and Brandin,” Jane said with a sudden rush of insight, cutting him off.

He nodded. “Indeed. I find them both … interesting. Two capable, formidable leaders in their own right, brothers in sorcery and conquest if in nothing else. And to make them adversaries, as well … it is a concept that suitably intrigues. Both are superior to any other character in the book, though Alberico’s ambitions blinded him early to treachery.”

Jane’s eyebrows couldn’t rise any higher. Standing in her kitchen, talking about the fictional works of Guy Gavriel Kay and listening to Loki deride the arrogant ambitions of a fictional villain …

“You think Brandin is better?” Her question lilted at the end as she struggled to control her mixture of amusement and disbelief.

“He is the more capable of the two.”

“That’s debatable. And besides, he laid waste to Tigana because of _emotion_ ,” she argued.

“Because of loss,” Loki corrected. “Loss is a powerful motivator.”

She knew with a chill that he was speaking from experience, recalling the death of his mother, Frigga. She debated ending the conversation there but after a small hesitation proceeded, genuinely interested in seeing where the conversation would lead. “He still acted out of emotion.”

Loki’s shrug was slight, a simple roll of the shoulders. “But he did not let it conquer him. He did what needed to be done and did not dwell on what he had lost. He did not let it cripple him.”

Jane knew he was speaking about more than just Brandin’s actions in the novel. The parallels had become blindingly obvious during the course of this conversation. She knew from experience that speaking of what had transpired in Loki’s past would lead to a surge of bitter anger. Opting to tread carefully through a minefield of possible replies, she settled with referring back to the novel. “Don’t write Alberico out just yet. He might surprise you.”

“It’s already apparent Brandin will be the one to emerge victorious. He is not hindered by the fetters of emotion as is Alberico.”

Jane laughed. She couldn’t help it. As the sound escaped her mouth, the expression on Loki’s face altered into one of cool reserve.

“I’m glad you’re enjoying it,” she said, and took a moment to be astounded by the fact that she actually meant it. “And after you finish the book, let me know if you still feel that way about Brandin. I’m curious.”

She paused on her way out of the kitchen, glancing back at him. He’d taken the book in hand again and had flipped it open to a marked page. “If you like that one, I have more by the same author.”

She knew his slight nod was the only acknowledgment she’d get. Shrugging, still mildly amused by the conversation that had just transpired, she made her way to the office.

**.x.**

The baton, which she had previously come to think of as a kind of lifeline, went with her most places. Sometimes, however, she forgot about it, her mind dwelling on other things of importance. Because of what had happened in the office that one night she made sure it was always with her while she worked. More often than not she forgot it there, although she was always certain to bring it to bed with her. Her forgetfulness regarding the weapon bothered her. It wasn’t that she saw Loki as being no longer dangerous; she did. It was that, when he was quiet and absorbed with reading, he presented less of a visual threat. When she saw him sitting before the fire with the book open across his knees she was lulled into a sense of false security. The more days that passed in this manner, the more inclined she was to let ease her guard. Sometimes her vigilance lapsed. When it happened she would berate herself. Loki was a deceiver. He might still see her as a victim, but she would not be one. Not anymore.

Every night when she went to bed, she made sure to lock the door.

**.x.**

The weather held fair for weeks, or as close to fair as it could get during winter this close to the Canadian Rockies. Every morning dawned bright and clear. The temperature remained just below freezing. Jane preferred it this way. She didn’t have to suit up in layers like she did on colder days and it was actually pleasant to take walks outdoors.

Being as she couldn’t wish Loki into non-existence, Jane began to spend more and more time on her work. She was in frequent contact with Bruce through email; he’d expressed interest in what she was doing even though astrophysics wasn’t his field of expertise. She submitted her progress every Friday to S.H.I.E.L.D, uploading her documents into their secure cloud storage. Things began to feel familiar to her again, the way they had prior to Malekith and the series of calamitous events that had followed. In some ways she welcomed this familiarity. In other ways she didn’t; it still hurt to be reminded of Erik and the time Before.

Loki had taken to spending time outdoors. Donning the gear she’d purchased from him, he often left the house for hours at a time. Jane never followed him, though she did stand at the living room window one day and watch as he vanished into the woods on the edges of the yard. She suspected he was returning to the site of his arrival. Sometimes she wondered if he would simply leave and not return.

It bothered her that she was conflicted on that particular issue.

He always came back. And they would resume their precarious balance around each other, she always vigilant and suspicious, he always coolly detached with an air of smug superiority. It was walking on eggshells taken to an entirely new level. Sometimes she contemplated goading him into an explosive rage simply to do something with all the tension that was ever present between them. She found herself wishing at unexpected intervals that he would bring up the book or the weather or simply _something_ to discuss. Living with someone this silent and closed off was like living with a ghost—a ghost with a penchant for striking, unexpected and lightning-swift, at the weakest spots in your armor. And so when she was around him she throttled the urge to speak or goad him to anger. He was dangerous, and even if it was utterly unnerving to live this way, a silent and shuttered Loki was better than one riled to action by fury.

**.x.**

On a day some four weeks after Loki’s arrival, Jane had decided to take some time off from her work. It was another beautiful day and the sun glinting off the snow through the window had been an invitation she couldn’t refuse. Loki had left the house a couple of hours earlier on one of his daily sojourns. Jane shut her laptop, stood up, locked her hands together behind her head and stretched. Feeling oddly cheerful this day for unknown reasons, she donned her boots, a lined jacket and gloves before leaving the house.

Outside, she paused on the steps and deliberated what to do. Eventually she wandered towards the woodshed. When the weather was this nice there was no real need for a fire, though Loki started one every night. Still, when the weather inevitably turned colder she’d need fuel for the stove, so she grabbed the splitting axe from where its blade was wedged in a stump and began chopping.

Splitting wood was hard work. It wasn’t long before she was sweating, and she paused to take her jacket off and drape it over the large stump she wasn’t using as a wood block. In her hooded sweatshirt she was still comfortably warm. Holding the axe loosely in one hand, she reached up with the other to shield her eyes from the glare of the midday sun as she scanned the yard. There was no sign of Loki. Just as well. She started to work again, loosing herself in the rhythm of the axe swing, gathering up the split pieces, arranging them in the wheelbarrow, and placing a new piece on the block. Sometime later her shoulders and upper back began to burn from the exertion and she decided to halt.

She glanced up and across the yard. The driveway to her house wound in an S shape out to the main road. Bordering the driveway on one side was a field belonging to a neighbor, or as close to a neighbor as could be in this rural area. Standing close to the fence on the neighbor’s side was a small group of horses. Jane smiled. The animals wandered this way every now and then. At first she’d been curious but hesitant to approach them; large animals were not something she was familiar with. Her curiosity had won out and she’d gone to see them the second time they’d appeared at the fence on a day in late autumn. There were four, all of them comfortable around a human presence. She’d grabbed handfuls of quack grass growing nearby and fed them all, delighting in their snuffling and the way they sniffed her pockets as though suspecting treats were hidden away there.

She wedged the axe into the chopping block and grabbed her jacket, shrugging it back on as she made her way across the yard to the horses. Two watched her come, ears pricked forward and heads hanging over the fence. The other two were disinterested, pawing in the snow for whatever remnants of grass they could find. She murmured to them as she approached, holding out her hands for inspection as she came to a halt.

She was not at all familiar with horse breeds, but she knew these were appaloosas from the assortment of white blankets and spots they all bore on their hindquarters. They had their winter coats, the hair of their hide thick and fluffy. The two at the fence slowly and thoroughly sniffed her hands, seeking out anything edible. Gradually reaching the realization that she’d come empty handed, one of the horses turned and wandered away from the fence, back toward the other two. The one that remained was persistent, blowing air into her face as she reached up to run her fingers through its thick, tangled forelock.

She heard Loki approach, then, his footsteps in the snow loud as they followed the trail she’d made. She half-turned to watch, her hand sliding down the horse’s neck. She had time to notice before he reached her that winter appeared to agree with him; he seemed utterly at ease in his snowy surroundings, moving without hindrance through the deep snow. There was some color in his face from exposure to the slight wind and his eyes as they moved from her to the animal were bright and focused. It troubled her no small amount to know that even in exile, even made mortal, Loki had an undeniable, imperious presence which commanded attention.

“These are not mounts bred for war,” he remarked as he came to a stop near her. The horse, sensing the possibility of a new source for food, shifted its weight and took a step in Loki’s direction. He held out one hand for inspection, just as Jane had done.

“I don’t think they’ve been bred for much of anything.” She watched as the horse moved closer to Loki, nudging at his coat pockets with its nose and feeling a little displeased that the animal was as willing to accept his company as it was hers. It was often said animals were deeply perceptive about the nature of people. Couldn’t this one sense that Loki was constrained chaos in motion?

“These are not well bred, true,” he said, passing a hand down the horse’s neck. Jane was surprised to see that he wore a faint expression of pleasure. “They are nothing compared to those of Asgard.”

“ _Everything_ on Earth is nothing compared to Asgard,” she reminded him wryly.

He glanced at her, smiling crookedly. “You are learning.”

The horse, having deduced that neither human had anything on their persons that was even remotely edible, turned and ambled through the snow towards the others. Jane turned as it departed, heading back in the direction of the yard. Loki caught up with her quickly, pacing himself to match her stride.

“Have you finished the book?” She asked him, speaking only to break the silence.

“I have not. Such is the depth and detail of description that it makes for slow reading.”

“Good reading, though.”

“Yes.” They’d reached the driveway and altered their path in the direction of the house. The sun had sunk low on the horizon and around them the impending shadows of dusk had crept forth to mar the snow.

She surprised herself by asking, “Where do you go? When you walk?”

He looked at her sidelong. “Through the forest.”

“Back to where you, uh, landed?”

“On occasion.”

“Why?”

They stood now at the bottom of the steps leading up to the front door. She was seized by an inexplicable, senseless need to know why he did what he did. His expression as he looked at her now was unreadable. Gone was the earlier hint of contentment. She read the warning that gathered in his eyes, clouding them, but heedlessly went on to speak.

“The way back isn’t out there.”

His eyes narrowed. “I have already grasped that obvious fact.”

“Loki …” She hesitated, torn between warring factions in her mind. She didn’t want to care. She had not wanted this. But the possibility that loomed before them both was an awful one, a phantom of unpleasant future which bound them together. It was something she had dwelt on for quite some time now and it needed to be voiced. “You need to … have you considered that maybe there isn’t a way back? That there won’t be a way back?”

His laughter, hard and cold and merciless, startled her. “Is that what you tell yourself, Jane, as you count the days and nights since last you saw Thor?”

The words were as pointed and hurtful as a slap. “This isn’t about Thor,” she snapped.

“Oh, but it is! Tell me that every time you look at me, every time you are aware of me, that you aren’t thinking of— _longing_ for—my brother! I am a reminder of what you cannot have, of what you could _never_ have!”

The truth in his words was a bitter knife. Jane exhaled slowly, working hard to keep control of her emotions. She strongly regretted saying anything; she should have kept her mouth shut. “You’re a reminder,” she said in a low, strained voice, “of how very fucked up things are in this universe.”

His smile was abrupt, a baring of teeth both contemptuous and cutting. “No.” He stepped closer, invading her personal space. She held herself upright, refusing to give way to his calculated intimidation. “I am a reminder of failure—Thor’s failure to rule and protect Asgard as he should have. And a reminder of your insignificance, your inability to be anything but _this_. If you were anything more, Jane, you’d be in Asgard ruling alongside my brother at this very moment. You think my efforts are why he has been absent so long from your world? Look deeper and you’ll find that you already know the hard truth. My brother has already forsaken you, but it pains him to dwell on it. Think! Why if for no other reason would he send me to you without seeking your aid in person first? It is too difficult. My brother, always the warrior, is utterly artless in anything that does not involve him swinging his hammer with glorious abandon.”

She hated him. She hated the way tears suddenly blurred her vision or the way she had to struggle to breathe past the knot in her chest. Hated too that everything he’d just said was only just an echo of thoughts she’d already had. Thor had been distant. Thor had been away for too long. Thor had left her in the hands of his enemies. She’d told herself it was because of strife in Asgard, but was that the truth …?

_Loki lies_ , Thor had told her more than once. And so she told herself now. But Loki’s words resonated so strongly with her own suspicions that all she could think was that it had to be true. Thor, if he’d ever loved her, loved her no more.

_No more than you ever loved him_ , whispered an insidious voice that had lain coiled in the darkest recesses of her mind, waiting for the right moment to strike.

She was struggling not to cry. She blinked furiously, swallowed hard, and whirled around. She would not do this. She would not sit here and listen to his vitriol, the poisonous words Loki couldn’t unleash on anyone but her because of the ruthless irony of his circumstance. But Loki was not so easily ignored. He followed her up the stairs, his voice a biting whip at her back. “I ensured my brother was kept busy as I ruled, but there were always opportunities, always chances he could have taken to leave, to come here to you. How long has it been, Jane, since you’ve been held in his tender, loving embrace?”

She wrenched the door open and tried to slam it in his face. He was too quick, catching it with both hands. A furious hiss left her as he crossed the threshold and she wheeled away, kicking off her boots and throwing her jacket down. She stopped, steeling herself. Slowly, she turned back around. He was watching her with an expression that was entirely vindictive in its pleasure.

“It’s a reminder to you, too,” she said quietly, her words threaded with an iron certainty, “of your failures. Of your losses. You’re no ruler, Loki. If my hopes for a life with Thor were foolish, what were your hopes of being the king when you’re not even Asgardian?”

She thought, fleetingly, of the baton where it lay on her desk in the office as he leapt at her. Seizing her by her upper arms, he twisted and slammed her hard into the wall. His fury was evident in every taut line of his face, in every harsh breath he took, in the enmity that was startlingly clear within the icy depths of his eyes.

She had crossed the line that should never have been crossed, but it was too late for anything else now. He could hurt her. He may even be able to kill her. All this she knew; she’d entered a state of terrifying hyper-awareness. Her pulse thundered in her ears, her breath came quick and unevenly. Despite all of it, she looked him square in the eye and spoke again.

“ _Frost giant_ ,” she said, disdain and fear making each word tremulous.

He made a sound that was pure, unadulterated rage and jerked her forward only to slam her back again. Jane gave a muted cry of mingled pain and panic. His fingers tightened around her arms with bruising force. Jane, recalling in the midst of her terror the core of who she _was_ and not who she _had been_ , surged against him, pushing herself away from the wall. She writhed in his grip, stomping down on his feet, fighting as though possessed. He shoved her back again and pinned her there even as she continued to fight.

“Go on, hurt me,” she urged with self-destructive abandon. “Kill me, Loki! What happens to you then? You’ll only last so long in this world before someone catches up with you. How will that end if you have no powers here?”

As the words left her mouth she surged hard to one side. His hand fell away from one arm and she strained against his hold on the other. Her vision had narrowed—all she could see was the cold brutal fire of his eyes. She lifted her free arm with the intent to deliver a blow to his face—imagined it, channeled all she felt into it—

He caught her hand. They grappled. His fingers on her skin again, struggling to entrap her, brushing against the nubs that had been her fingers—

And suddenly he stilled.

His eyes were no longer focused with lethal intensity upon her face. Instead they had found her injured hand, trapped by his own. Several expressions crossed his face in fleeting succession, too swiftly for her to identify them all. He moved his gaze back to hers. Long heartbeats passed. Jane realized with a kind of numb detachment that she was trembling. She jerked her hand out of his, but it was he that backed away.

“I—”

But he broke off, swallowing hard whatever words it was he had intended to say. In the stark, absolute silence that had fallen between them they stared at each other for a string of moments suspended in time.

When time snapped back into flow, he tore his eyes from hers and left.

**.x.**

 

 

 

 

 

 


	6. Old Pieces

**.6.**  

The year after Jane had met Thor, Eric had given her a birthday present. The act itself was anomalous; Eric was incredibly forgetful about some things in life. For all the years she’d known him he’d never once remembered her birthday on time. He always made up for his forgetfulness in this department by taking her out for dinner or making other thoughtful gestures. That year in particular, as he presented her with her gift—a small box wrapped in newspaper—Jane had been nothing short of astonished.

The gift itself surpassed anything and everything she could have imagined in generosity from her oldest friend. Lying inside the box was a silver small charm meant for a necklace. Jane had gently grasped it with two fingers and lifted it up for closer inspection. A year ago she wouldn’t have recognized the charm and even if she had, it would have meant nothing. Now, however …

“It’s Mjolnir,” Erik said unnecessarily. “I, ah, found it … after he came. Thor …”

He’d mistaken Jane’s silence for disapproval. In truth, Jane was fighting hard not to burst into tears. It was a thoughtful, compassionate gesture by someone she loved dearly and she knew that no other gift would ever be able to compare. Aware that Eric was growing increasingly distraught by her silence, she turned to him and flashed a brilliant, watery smile. “It’s perfect, Erik. Absolutely perfect.”

He never got a chance to reply because she’d thrown herself at him and encompassed him in a tight, inescapable embrace. Instead he’d patted her back awkwardly, his own eyes a little wet as her tears dampened his shirt.

**.x.**

Once Jane had made the final decision to go into hiding she’d had to pack quickly. Obviously she wouldn’t be able to take everything—only what could fit in a vehicle. Darcy, via S.H.I.E.L.D, would send her other belongings once she’d settled in a new home. Jane had set about the business of packing up her life with brisk, detached efficiency. She couldn’t afford to think about what had just happened. She couldn’t afford to dwell. For her own survival—for her own sanity—she needed to go somewhere else and become someone else. It was easier than she’d thought it would be, leaving behind items she’d once cherished and considered invaluable. This new Jane, reborn from the fires of horror and suffering, could live without a great deal of life’s little, inconsequential luxuries.

She’d forgotten all about the necklace with the Mjolnir charm. It had been lying on the bedside table beside her alarm clock. That was where she put it every night before she went to sleep. It was something she had worn every day for a long period of time. Somewhere between her encounters with the third and first of Thor’s enemies, however, she’d started to fall out of that habit.

With two suitcases half-packed lying upon her unmade bed, Jane stared down at the little silver charm her closest friend had given her. That friend was now dead. The man the charm represented hadn’t appeared on Earth for such a long, long time. That man, the man she cared about so much, hadn’t been the one to rescue her this time. Once, she’d considered the Mjolnir charm to be a kind of talisman, something that would bring her good fortune as long as she wore it. She’d treasured too the memories that the necklace brought her, often cradling the small charm in her cupped palms and gazing at it while her thoughts turned to Thor and everything she loved about him.

When she left her home that night for the very last time, the necklace was still on the night table.

**.x.**

Sleep was coyly elusive. Jane, still shaken to her core by what had transpired between herself and Loki, had spent the darkest hours of the night seated in the big armchair she’d dragged in front of the fire. Where Loki was, she didn’t know; such was her frayed, chaotic state of mind that he could have left the house and she wouldn’t have known it. A part of her wished he would go, out the door and out of her life. Another part of her, the part she couldn’t comprehend and wished she could hate, wanted him to stay for reasons that were utterly unfathomable.

That he’d shoved her didn’t surprise her. Loki was a walking representation of turmoil—chaos, rage, and chained bitterness in motion. That he was prone to violence she already knew from what she’d witnessed during the events in New York. In truth, she’d half-expected him to kill her. The true surprise came in the way their confrontation had ended.

He’d backed down. He’d surrendered, in a way. And Jane had no idea why.

The possibilities as to why he'd done so haunted her, assailing her every thought, wearing at her already ragged emotions. And so she spent the night in the chair, knees pulled up to her chest with her arms wrapped around them, staring into the fire and fervently willing the madly riotous world to right itself so that she could try to find her balance yet again.

**.x.**

Time was not as disconcerted as Jane was by what had transpired and so it continued on. Days became weeks. Loki and Jane co-existed in a very strained manner. It was clear that whatever revelation Loki had had that night had rattled him as much as the confrontation had shook her. He was reticent, moving throughout the house as though he walked a different plane of existence from Jane. It certainly felt that way. On the rare occasions when he did speak to her it was only because she’d spoken first. And when he did speak, he never looked at her. His eyes always found some other focal point. Sometimes, though, she would catch him watching her. She’d turn from putting wood in the fire to find his eyes upon her. Most of the time, his attention was on the hand that lacked the two fingers, his expression one of sombre, intense speculation. When she caught him he would never quickly glance away as though embarrassed and ashamed. Instead he would meet her eyes levelly and hold them for a time before mutely turning his attention elsewhere.

 _What are you thinking?_ she wanted to ask. But then she would remember that she didn’t want to know. Couldn’t know, for the sake of keeping herself together. Somewhere deep inside, she had an inclination as to the truth. Somewhere deep inside, she also knew that that truth would terrify her as nothing else could. And so it remained buried as far beneath all the other terrors and worries of her life as she could put it. That it would resurface someday, she had no doubt. She only hoped it would be at a time in the far distant future.

**.x.**

Christmas crept closer. By Jane’s count it had been nearly two months since Loki’s arrival. And in all that time there’d be no sign of Thor or any other Asgardian, no indication that the situation was going to be remedied. If Loki were truly in exile for the reasons he claimed, Asgard was in dire trouble indeed. The war Loki spoke of—if he’d been telling the truth—must be of terrifying proportions. What if, she found herself wondering frequently, Loki was never permitted to return to his own realm? What if, because of this celestial war Loki had mentioned, Thor had no way to retrieve his brother? What happened then? Jane tried not to think about that. She tried not to think about anything to do with realms beyond Earth. Trying not to and succeeding at it, however, were two very different things.

Less than a week before Christmas, Jane made her way back into Woodrill on a grocery run. The weather had been for the most part fair since Loki’s arrival. There had only been a couple of days with flurries occurring at random, never lasting long. The sky as she drove to town was darkening even though it was only late afternoon; the shortness of the winter days were something Jane had had difficulty adjusting to. The traffic she encountered was surprisingly busy, even for a town as transient as Woodrill. She surmised the onset of Christmas was the cause.

The town itself was openly festive. As she slowly drove past the urban residences on her way to do her shopping she was barraged from all sides by all things Christmas. Every home was decorated in some manner, the bright, cheery multi-colored strands of lights giving even the frigid winter night a warm glow, the sun having already set. Though she’d been prepared for it, though she’d expected it, the lights and decorations triggered a pang of reminiscent longing that was so strong that it was almost painful. Despite that fact, she genuinely enjoyed the holiday scenery. She hadn’t realized how gorgeous Christmas in a winter setting could actually be.

Despite her firm resolve to not dwell on holidays and who she’d spent them with in the past, Jane found herself looking at items in the grocery store that were meant for a Christmas dinner. And suddenly, surprising herself, she thought, _why the hell not?_ She had no idea how to cook a turkey or make stuffing. She had her cookbooks, though, which she’d accumulated when she’d finally discovered she enjoyed the task of cooking. Such was her new mindset that it didn’t matter that she was inexperienced at creating large, festive meals; feeling oddly inspired, Jane began grabbing all the things she’d need to create a full Christmas dinner. Her separation from friends and family didn’t necessitate that she spend it utterly devoid of anything that might bring comfort.

She thought, briefly, of Loki as she pushed her shopping cart through the icy, near-empty grocery store parking lot towards her truck. That he would scoff at the concept and meaning of Christmas, she had no doubt. Perhaps he was already well aware; he did seem very well versed in most everything else about humans and their customs. And even if he wasn’t familiar with the concept, she had no intent of sharing it with him. She would embrace the holiday in her own shuttered, reclusive way. Inwardly she would remember Christmases past, recall the fond holiday memories she’d shared with her family, Darcy, and Erik. Those were her gifts and her comfort.

She’d opted to forego her iced capp this time around. She left Woodrill and headed for home. Night had fallen completely. Through the windshield Jane could see brilliant night sky canvas, unpolluted by city lights in this remote rural area. The sky was thick with stars, the lights of which glinted and shone with a crisp, clear light. Her trained eyes made out constellations and mapped clusters as she drove. She’d never in her life seen a night sky as lovely and pure as that which appeared every evening here in the north.

The stars weren’t the only treat for her eyes. In the total darkness the Christmas lights of every house she passed on her way twinkled and beckoned with cheerful seasonal charm. One yard had a number of animals constructed entirely of lights, horses and reindeer that pranced among each other. Other houses were dressed up with careful consideration toward color coordination; a large house artfully illuminated in strands of yellow and blue was so attractive that she slowed her truck in order to get a better look.

It was then that the dam broke.

Unbidden and unexpected emotion overwhelmed every painstakingly constructed barrier Jane had erected within her mind. As her vision blurred dangerously, she braked and guided her vehicle to the shoulder of the highway before shifting into park. And then she let go entirely, giving way before the intensity of all she felt. She missed Darcy. And Erik—god, she missed him too, so much that the memory of him was nearly a physical burden, wearing her down with each passing day. She missed life as it used to be, when she was blissfully unaware of any other realm but this one. She missed normalcy and consistency and cohesion in her life. Sitting in her truck, the blue and yellow Christmas lights of the house across the road blurring as she blinked a steady stream of tears from her eyes, Jane wept as she hadn’t in such a long time. She cried for the friend she’d lost and the friend she couldn’t be with and for what she’d lost of herself in these last brutally turbulent years. She cried at the unreachable promise of the stars that drew her eyes ever upwards, of the merciless truths they housed that she’d stumbled so unwittingly upon. And she cried too for the loneliness that she was never without now, the life of solitude she’d never expected or wanted but that she’d had to accept.

Jane didn’t know how long she sat in her parked truck, allowing herself to feel in all the ways she had worked so hard not to. It had to happen eventually—she’d known this. Better here, parked on the shoulder of a highway, then in her home where Loki stalked the halls as a relentless, constant threat. Such were the parameters of her life now. Her weaknesses were something she could not share with anyone. When finally she could blink without tears spilling over, Jane leaned her head back against the seat and sighed. The thought of returning home, to the house that had been such a comforting little haven for too short a time, filled her with unease. But the crux of it was that she had nowhere else to go. Home to Loki or onward to nothing—it was a milder, insidious version of a rock and a hard place.

Sniffling still, wiping at her eyes with one hand, Jane shifted the truck into drive, checked her mirrors, and eased back out onto the highway. In the rear view mirror, the Christmas lights she’d so admired dwindled away to nothing.

**.x.**

Jane had made a point of turning on the outdoor light when she’d left the house earlier in the day, knowing she’d be returning in the early dark of a winter night. She’d purchased so many groceries that she’d have to make two trips. After unlocking the front door, she stepped inside and deposited the very full plastic bags on the floor before glancing quickly inside. There was no sign of Loki. With an inward shrug, she turned and headed back out to her truck.

When she came inside the second time, he was standing at the entry to the porch. She paused in the act of closing the door. She knew her face was red and her eyes swollen from the abundance of tears she’d shed earlier—it was obvious she’d been upset. She waited for him to say something as they stared at each other in the strained silence that had become so common between the two of them. Instead, with no expression whatsoever, he bent and picked up two bags of groceries before turning and heading for the kitchen. Jane blinked, surprised. After a moment she finished closing the door and locked it. Removing her coat and boots, she picked up the remaining bags and followed after Loki. He was already gone, seated on the chair near the fire, a book in hand. Jane contemplated thanking him, but opted not to. These days, anything she said was likely to be met by cold silence or cruel remarks, neither of which she wanted to deal with.

**.x.**

On Christmas day, Jane proved herself capable of managing a large meal. She hadn’t decorated her house. She had no lighthearted Christmas music blaring from the speakers of her laptop. She found she didn’t need either of those, however, to invoke the warmth and comfort of Christmas—the wonderful smells of the meal she’d created did all that on its own. She wasn’t a culinary expert, by any means; the turkey and stuffing were a little dry. But it didn’t matter—it was all edible and, in her opinion, perfectly delicious.

She had no doubts Loki knew what day it was. When he’d risen that morning to find her already awake and hard at work in the kitchen, he’d watched her for a little while with a faint expression of mingled amusement and disdain. Aware of his scrutiny, she’d paused in the act of stuffing the turkey to turn and glare at him. With a little shake of his head, he rolled his shoulders in a disinterested shrug and walked off. Determined not to let his presence ruin her day, she instead focused intently on the task at hand, anticipating the finished product.

Hours later, when the meal was done and ready to eat, Jane leaned back against the counter to survey the repast before her. She’d done just fine for her first attempt at a holiday meal. The entire process, though hard work, had left her feeling contented and at ease. Jane took a few more minutes to bask in these feelings while she sipped at her wine. She wasn’t much for alcohol in general, but she did have an affinity for a dry red. Her rumbling stomach was what prompted her to grab a plate and start dishing up food; she’d abstained from eating anything aside from an orange in the morning in order to be able to fully appreciate this meal.

Plate heaped with the fruits of her labor, Jane grabbed her wineglass and took a seat at the kitchen table. The first morsel she decided to sample was the cranberry chutney, which she’d never had before. It was sweet, tart, and absolutely what she’d hoped for. Pleased, she speared a length of asparagus—cooked along with slices of mushrooms, onions, and crushed garlic—and brought it to her mouth. Cooking, she mused with satisfaction, was fast becoming a hobby to rival all others.

Her next mouthful of food paused midway to her mouth. Loki had entered the kitchen and was standing there as he surveyed the feast Jane had prepared. She hadn’t invited him to eat. She’d even considered making a point of banning him from partaking just for the sake of being mulish. In the end, she’d simply chosen not to talk to him at all. Moving the fork to her mouth and taking the mouthful—potatoes mashed with garlic butter and shredded cheese—she chewed in silence while eyeing him warily.

Having effectively taken stock of everything she’d made in the past eight hours, he transferred his attention to her. “Impressive. I’ve seen Asgardian feasts with less to offer.”

Jane felt a little of the tension that had appeared the moment he’d walked into the room lessen. Just before taking a sip of her wine, she said in a pleasant tone, “Thank you.”

“Food to celebrate the holiday season?”

She listened carefully for the always subtle but always present undertones of condescension and arrogance in his words, but didn’t hear them. “In part,” she replied. Gesturing with her fork to the hearty display of food that littered the kitchen in an array of pots, pans, and bowls, she said, “Help yourself.”

His response to that was to grab the opened bottle of red wine from the counter, arching an eyebrow in her direction. Jane nodded her permission and went back to her food, inwardly contemplating his sudden change in behavior. This was the most he’d spoken to her in weeks. She felt a brief flare of hope—perhaps he’d decided civility would make his exile more bearable, after all? She tempered that hope almost immediately. If there was anything she’d learned about Loki, it was that he was unpredictability personified. Maybe he was bored and simply wanted conversation—all he did most days was read and spend hours outdoors. Maybe he really was contrite, though she seriously doubted it. 

Or maybe, she mused wryly as she watched him heap food onto the plate he’d grabbed, he was just hungry and decided to work his way into her favor just in order to eat the meal she’d made.

He joined her at the table. Though her first instinct was to make small talk, she quashed it immediately. If he wanted conversation, it was up to him to start it. Even with Loki seated so near, Jane still felt remarkably content, better than she had in weeks. Part of it, she knew, was that cooking all day and eating the meal she’d prepared had brought upon a powerful sense of nostalgia. She didn’t care. Even if for a night, she wanted—needed—to feel some semblance of happy.

“What meat is this?” He asked her after a time, indicating with his fork a slice of meat that he’d coated in gravy.

“Bison,” she told him. She was particularly pleased with that dish, which she’d cooked in a roaster along with carrots, potatoes, and onions.

“What I said earlier was not in jest. You have created a most impressive feast.”

Jane’s eyebrows shot up at this. Civil Loki was unusual. Loki plying her with praise wasn’t just unusual, it was completely out of character. Jane swallowed her mouthful as she considered him from across the table. His expression was mild. His voice hadn’t hinted at anything untoward. He was watching her as he ate, waiting for her response.

“… Thank you,” was all she managed, still trying to understand his game. In a gambit to keep things moving, she said, “Though you exaggerate. I’ve seen Asgardian feasts. A lot of goat and … other things.”

Surprising her even further, he laughed. He set his fork down in order to take a drink of wine. Every mannerism he had screamed of total self-assurance. His movements were precise, confident, neat. She’d seen him in a frenzied rage. She’d seen him irritated. She’d seen him, the day he’d been sent to Earth, utterly distraught as he lay in a crater in the snow. He had an air now of being utterly at ease. This, she realized, was Loki the prince—adept at all manners of social interaction, affable and able to charm even the most reluctant of individuals.

 _Be very, very careful_ , whispered a voice in Jane’s mind. _Something is not right …_

“Feasts in Asgard, like everything else, are as much a matter of over-quantifying as they are anything else.”

Jane knew this was true, having eaten at several during her time in Asgard. Raising her wine glass, smiling sweetly at him over the rim, she asked, “And of course the food in Asgard, like everything else, is better than it is here?”

He’d caught the edge in her voice and gave her back his own smile. “Perhaps not always.”

She tried to mask it as much as she could, this sense of being off balance, caused by his change in attitude. This was a new Loki, entirely unfamiliar to her. This Loki, she knew, was one that could warm even the iciest of personalities. It wasn’t just his voice, casual and relaxed, holding in it more warmth than she’d ever heard before. It wasn’t just his words, creating easy and relatable banter. And his eyes—Jane found herself struggling not to meet them, so seemingly open and candid they were. As they both went on eating, Loki began to speak to her of memorable feasts from his past, things he’d eaten—such as roasted bilgesnipe—on a dare from his brother. Even as Jane struggled to hold onto her conviction that this new face of Loki’s was a false one, she wondered at all he was sharing with her, at the insight she was gaining into his life as a prince, a trickster, a favored son of Odin. His stories told of another Loki, one without ambitions of monstrous proportions, one without a tendency towards the cruel and violent. To her dismay, Jane found herself wanting more than a little to know this other Loki in greater detail.

It was a pleasant meal, her suspicions aside. She’d cooked a great meal and she didn’t need Loki to tell her that. After helping herself to dessert—a chocolate-vanilla-strawberry trifle—and feeling tremendously full, Jane finally laid her spoon aside and leaned back in her chair as she swirled the last bit of wine in her glass. Loki, who’d just finished explaining to her the rarest delicacies of Asgard, finished his own dessert, pushed his plate away, and propped his elbows up on the table.

 _Bad manners_ , she wanted to tell him, but was feeling too sleepily contented from what she supposed was the tryptophan to even bother.

“How did you lose your fingers?”

All feelings of well-being and peace drained from her immediately. Here then was the other shoe dropped, just as she’d feared. He’d asked the question in a casual, conversational tone, but she knew that it was a facade, meant to lull her into complacently answering. For so many reasons that she couldn’t even name them all, she didn’t want to answer that question. Giving it to him would just be giving him another weapon in his arsenal meant to emotionally wound and cripple.

She downed the rest of her wine and set the glass back down harder than she needed to. Standing, she picked up her plate and began walking to the sink. She was waylaid, however, by Loki pushing his chair directly into her path. She stared down at him with narrowed eyes, hating that she’d actually enjoyed their meal together, hating that she’d known it was a ruse all along but had still went along with it.

“A simple question, Jane, that’s all I ask.”

“It’s your reasons for asking it,” she said tightly, “that make me keep my mouth shut.”

His smile was a quicksilver flicker across his face. “I cannot blame you for that reasoning. And if I told you I ask for the sake of mere curiosity?”

Jane shook her head. “It isn’t that simple with you.”

She turned in order to walk around the kitchen island, bypassing him entirely on her way to the sink. His hand on her wrist stopped her. Not wanting to drop her plate, she restrained from pulling away, but the glare she leveled on him was one of furious intensity.

“Let me go, Loki.”

But he shook his head, dark hair sliding across his shoulders with the movement. “Give me the answer and I will.”

“Why is it any of your business?”

All remnants of the talkative, affable Loki had vanished. Here now was the man she was more familiar with than she had ever wanted to be, so very confident and authoritative. His eyes on hers held no hints as to what he was thinking in their icy blue depths. His grip on her wrist was unrelenting. When he spoke, all traces of friendly camaraderie were gone from his words. “The answer, Jane.”

His reluctance to give his reasons grated on her nerves. “It’s none of your concern.”

“It shouldn’t be,” he acknowledged after a long moment. His voice had dropped in volume. “This I know.” His fingers loosened from around her wrist and glided downward to her own, sliding over the remnants of the two she’d lost. The sensation was utterly disarming and she jerked her hand away with such force that she unbalanced herself. As she tottered, struggling to not to drop what she carried in the other hand, it was Loki that caught her by the elbow as he came to his feet.

“You cannot outrun me here, Jane. I am a fixture now in your life. As much as you hate it,” he said, his smile mirthless, "and as much as I hate it. I find myself confounded by the quandary you offer—you are so very, very changed from the Jane my brother courted before. Colder. Harder. Even merciless in some ways, I think.”

He’d let her go. Jane had skirted around him hastily, moving to the sink and placing her dish carefully within. He hadn’t followed, but his words did.

“I wondered for so long why my brother sent me here the way he did. Why he hadn’t come to you first. Why Odinson, in all his self-righteous glory, could not look me in the eye upon rendering my verdict to me. He spoke your name, Jane, but he looked away as he did so. Such a simple thing, that, but it has remained with me all this time.”

“The answer,” he continued as she turned to stare at him in mute dismay, “lay with you. In how you’ve changed. In your behaviour. In your bearing. In your … injury.” His eyes dropped to her hand, the one that was no longer whole, for only a heartbeat before returning to hers. “In my time ruling under the guise of the Allfather, I kept my brother very busy so that he could not pry into matters that did not concern him. I distracted him by creating threats where there were none, by promising him ample opportunities to prove his strength and vigilance in combat. I assumed—wrongly, it seems—that he would always find time to return to Midgard, to this pathetic realm he holds in such high regard and to his little mortal love that he cherished so.”

“But he did not,” Loki went on relentlessly, even as Jane felt all the rage and fear and helplessness she’d tried to keep away returning with tidal force. “Because if he had, your hand would still be whole. It was no accident, losing your fingers—if it had been you would not keep the cause so closely guarded. No, they were _taken_ from you, by force. You, Jane, were at some point very much the damsel in distress, and my brother did not come for you. And that is why he could not meet my eyes when he said your name, when he sent me here. _Shame_. Thor’s shame is what has kept him from you. It is why he did not tell you in person of my exile. It is why he has not returned. He knows of what happened to you, Jane. He knows and has not come.”

Silence fell, the last of his words hanging with terrible poignance in the air between them. Jane made no sound, made no movement, as tears slid unchecked down her face. Everything she’d feared, everything she’d hoped, wished, _prayed_ hadn’t been true—Loki had given her an answer, after all. An answer that had shattered something inside her and rendered her vulnerable to every subsequent spinning, jagged shard.

“You think me cruel,” Loki said softly, approaching her until he was within distance to touch, to shove, to cling to. “I am. You think me heartless. At times, I am that as well. But I am only what Fate and circumstance have shaped me to be. Is it not the same with you, Jane? Tempered by the trials you have endured, you have become something else. We are not the same, you and I, but we are similar in the methods of our creation. I thought you a fool once before, a simpering mortal blinded to all but Thor and the future he offered you that was impossible.”

“I’m not like you,” was all she could say in a thin, wavering voice. It was the only defense she could mount with her emotions as ragged and wounded as they were.

“You are not. You never could be. I said we are similar. I think you know it, Jane. Why if for no other reason have you not given me to S.H.I.E.L.D or cast me out? It is not out of loyalty to Thor—your reactions and words have already indicated what I have suspected. Whatever you felt for my brother has faded, due in part, I think, to whatever happened that cost you your fingers. You allowed me in. You granted me haven.”

She couldn’t deny any of it. She wanted to, so very, very badly.

He had drawn closer, one careful step at a time, approaching her with a hunter’s careful tread as though she were prey that might flee. He stood before her now, filling up her vision, his eyes a magnetic pull that she no longer had the strength to resist. “What I offer now,” he said slowly, softly, as though his words could send her running, “is not out of gratitude. Nor is it out of pity. I offer you solace. I offer you insight. I offer you a diversion from what I know haunts your thoughts every waking moment. You are not my enemy, though once I believed you were. You are something else entirely, though I do not know what, not yet …”

She ached. She hurt from within, loss and anger intermingling with hopelessness. With sorrow. With loneliness so acute and razor-edged that she felt it as a million little cuts. When Loki’s hand cupped her cheek she leaned into his touch, closing her eyes as inwardly a part of her mind screamed at her to fight, to run, to do anything but _this_. Morality wavered between the ever shifting line of _right_ and _wrong_ , of what was then and what was now. Loki’s cruelest insult was also the truest: she was mortal. She was human. And she needed what every human needed at some point in their lives, needed it so desperately that every nerve in her body hummed with the intensity of that need.

His lips on hers were subtle at first, a test of willingness and acceptance. When she didn’t pull away, when she didn’t fight back, his kiss slowly became as he was—confident, demanding, enthralling. She wasn’t clinging to him. Her hands had crept upwards somehow, at some point, and were laid flat against his chest as though to keep him at bay, as though to push him back. But she did neither, her mind utterly lost in a dizzying free-fall as his lips moved apart from hers, ghosting over her cheek, tasting the remnants of her tears. His hands cupped her face, tilting it upwards, his fingers long and deft and surprisingly soft in their touch—

The phone rang.

Reality reasserted itself like a cruel, brutal slap. She tore herself free of his touch, staggering away, running a hand over her lips, her face, through her hair as she shook her head in useless denial. She spun back around to see him, to find that his expression wasn’t unreadable, wasn’t cold or mocking or cruel. What she saw on his face was a trace of the longing and desire she’d known in such potency just a moment ago, and it shook her to the core. But even as she watched it altered and he became composed, hiding what he wanted better than she could ever hope to hide what she had felt. And then came that smile, that dazzling smile meant to entice and disarm and weaken.

“The offer stands.”

Jane knew her expression was stricken, knew her face had paled in the wake of what she’d done and allowed him to do. It was the continued blaring of the phone that brought her back to some semblance of herself. Wheeling, she left the kitchen, racing down the hall to her office. She slammed the door and backed away from it, feeling for the phone that resided on her desk. Once it was in her shaking hands she fumbled with the receiver until the speaker was by her mouth.

She gasped an unintelligible greeting, all her thoughts on the man she’d just left standing in her kitchen.

“Jane? Merry Christmas!”

“Bruce,” she whispered, and with a breathless sob, collapsed to her knees.

**.x.**


	7. A Reprieve

**.7.**

Jane had become very familiar with the art of lying.

Kneeling on the floor of her office, her heart hammering in her chest, she mustered her resolve and lied to Bruce. _I’m alright,_ she told him between choked sobs. _It’s the time of year. Christmas. I miss Erik. I miss Darcy. I miss the way everything used to be._

_I’m sorry,_ he told her. It nearly broke her heart to know that he absolutely meant it.

She calmed down eventually. Was able to breathe without panicked gasping, was able to blink without seeing Loki’s haunting, enticing visage, was able to focus on things other than how good, how very _wonderful_ it had felt to be touched again, to be kissed again, to be wanted.

She lied to Bruce and told him she was okay. And after the conversation was over, his worries placated and the subsequent pleasantries exchanged, she then lied to herself about what had transpired with Loki such a short time ago: _I didn’t want it. I didn’t need it. I hated it—_

Jane had become very good at lying.

**.x.**

It was a role reversal. In the following days it was Jane that moved through the house as a ghost of her former self, silent and wary. What had happened between them was of such consequence that it couldn’t be ignored though she fervently wished it could. No, she couldn’t ignore it, couldn’t even try to because of Loki’s presence. His touch and his words and his _kiss_ had irrevocably changed them both. And now it was he that spoke, he that started and carried conversations while Jane watched him guardedly, remembering all the things she shouldn’t.

_His words_. They haunted her always. In this new and sadistic game of house they were playing, Loki’s words were nearly her undoing every single day. She knew what he was attempting. She knew what he wanted. And it was a brutal truth, a terrible truth, to know that some large part of her wanted it as well. He wasn’t wooing her now exactly, but he was testing the waters. He was probing the new, flimsy defenses she’d erected around her emotions and heart and soul. He was looking for a way to free her of her ever-wavering convictions.

Every night, lying in bed and feeling utterly lost beneath the weight of everything she felt, Jane despaired because it was becoming harder and harder to remember _why_ Loki was someone she should hate.

**.x.**

In her dream, she was not earthborn. She was simply energy, a fluidic, incorporeal being. She was unfettered by earthly travesties, by the moral ambiguities she’d known once in another life, in another form. Like this, she could simply _be_. And in a way that was heart-aching and soul-rending it was perfect, to allow thoughts and time and space flow around her unhindered by any substantial barriers of her own creation.

And then she was caught. And no longer could she just _be_. No, she had to think now, and feel, and subject herself to the cruel whims of an unjust universe. A cry left her, silent and sorrowful and desperate, lost to the spiteful vacuum of space as the pain she felt at the loss of such freedom remade her into something physical.

She came awake. She opened her eyes. And she saw instantly that Loki stood in her bedroom.

She could have reacted the way she wanted to, the way he expected her to. Instead she sat up slowly, passing a hand over her dry, gritty eyes and through her hair, knotted by sleep. Closed her eyes again and took a long moment to remember, to try and recapture, that distant sense of glorious freedom she’d known in the dream. Marshalled her inner resolve, girding herself to face yet another difficult day made so by the man standing before her.

“My door was locked.” Her first words of the morning, words to him, were soft and slow.

She’d reluctantly allowed her eyes to find him, drawn as they always were by the magnetism of his mere presence. He stood with his clasped hands behind his back, his gaze unwavering upon her. He smiled as he so often did now, a gesture that carried in it a devastating amount of roguish charm.

“Locks have never proven much of a hindrance to me.”

She didn’t doubt that. She also refused to reflect on the fact that for the duration of his stay in her home, he could have entered her room at any given time. She was already nearly powerless in this unwanted situation; that he could so easily breach a barrier she’d had confidence in made her feel even more so. Resigning herself to that fact, she asked what needed to be asked.

“Why are you in here?”

“If I said it was to see you at your most fetching …?” Again, that smile. Jane knew what she looked like. She slept in an over-sized blue T-shirt and black and blue plaid pajama pants. There would be large, dark shadows under her eyes. Her hair was an uncombed monstrosity. And despite this Loki made her feel otherwise, made her feel attractive and desirable.

Which was why everything between them had become so dangerous.

She ignored the smile. It was difficult to do. Instead, she hardened her voice as she pitched her next question at him. “Why, Loki?”

He sighed, a sound of light-hearted regret. And then, in a seamless mercurial shift, his mien altered into one of seriousness. It shook her, how quickly he could move so completely from one mood to another.

“Someone is here. Outside, in a vehicle. They arrived late last night.”

Jane had let her gaze wander in order to keep her eyes from Loki. At his words, her head snapped back around to face him. Fear and alarm rolled over her.

“Who?”

He shook his head. “They haven’t left the vehicle.”

“You were awake?”

“I sleep lightly. I heard the sound of their arrival. I rose to see what it was. Given my … _status_ … here, it seemed wise that I not show myself.”

“You should have woken me!”

“To what end, Jane? Had our visitor meant to storm the house and take either of us captive they would have done so by now. I certainly could not stop them, not as I am now. That they’ve remained in the vehicle indicates they were waiting for daylight. I waited until then to rouse you.”

Jane huffed out a sigh, the sound one of anxiety, irritation, and uncertainty mixed together. His words made sense, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that whoever the morning brought with it meant dire trouble. She slid out of bed and motioned for Loki to leave the room. Surprising her, he did so without further comment, closing the door quietly behind himself.

Her stomach was roiling as she considered the possibilities as to who this visitor was. She was almost certain it was someone from S.H.I.E.L.D. It was the only thing that made the least bit of sense. Either they were checking up on her or Loki had somehow appeared on their radar. But what if it was someone else?

What if, her mind posed, this _was_ someone else, another enemy of the Avengers and Thor? What if her new life, name, and location hadn’t been enough to keep her safe after all?

Jane swallowed hard, moving around the room, grabbing clothes and putting them on. Whoever was outside the house, she’d go out to face them. She didn’t really have another choice.

It was a cold comfort that she felt better knowing that with Loki here, at least she wasn’t alone.

**.x.**

Garbed in her coat, gloves, and boots, Jane paused outside the door to her house. In a quick exchange she and Loki had both agreed that he only show himself if the unknown visitor posed a threat to her. He’d be watching from the window in his bedroom, which allowed for an uninterrupted view of the yard.

The vehicle was sitting in the middle of the driveway just as Loki had said it would be, parked behind her own truck. It was a black SUV; as Jane warily approached she the Chevy insignia emblazoned on the front grille. The windshield was fogged over, effectively obscuring her view of whomever was inside. Beneath her feet the snow crunched with each step she took. She circled around the vehicle to the driver’s side, noting as she did so that the license plate bore rental stickers. She approached the driver’s door from the rear. This window had only the faintest etchings of delicate frost designs and wasn’t yet fogged over, allowing her to glimpse clearly the person who sat inside.

It was Bruce.

She made a noise of stunned disbelief. He was asleep, head lolled to the side, chin brushing against his chest. She could see that he was garbed in a bulky winter coat. The temperature was just below zero Celsius, which was relatively warm in this climate at this time of year. It would still be chilly in a vehicle that wasn’t running, which led Jane to assume that he’d likely started it at intervals during his wait in order to let the interior warm up before shutting it off again. And all of this because he was too polite, too kind, to ring the doorbell in the earliest hours of the morning and rouse Jane from her sleep.

Seeing him like this, asleep and vulnerable and _here,_ assaulted Jane with a wave of relief that was immediately replaced by a potent shock of alarm. She knew why he was here—obviously her on-the-fly cover story during their conversation on Christmas day had failed to do the trick. He’d been worried about her. He’d come to check on her. And at any other time in her life, she would have been ecstatic to see him. But now, with Loki in her house …

Jane wavered for long moments, fighting with indecision. Finally, she shook her head and stepped up to the vehicle. She had to face him. She had to speak with him.

She had to convince him she was fine.

She rapped on the window softly with one gloved hand. When that failed to wake him, she rapped harder. Bruce’s head jerked up and he blinked rapidly behind the lenses of his glasses, turning his head in the direction of the sound. When he saw her standing there a warm, genuine smile creased his face. She gave him the same kind of greeting and stepped back as he opened the door.

“It’s so good to see you,” she told him as he got out of the vehicle and closed the door behind him.

“You too, Jane,” he said. The two of them both took a step toward each other and then paused. Her laugh was tentative, his smile awkward, but when he opened his arms she walked right into the embrace.

“I was worried.” His voice beside her ear was one of the most wonderful things she’d ever heard and she brought her arms up to hug him back tightly.

“You didn’t have to be,” she said, stepping away as he released her. “I’m sorry if I scared you.”

“I wasn’t scared. Just concerned. This last year has been a rough one for you. And you’re up here all by yourself. Way, way up here,” he amended, turning a little to take stock of the yard and the house, all of it blanketed in a thick layer of snow.

“What time did your flight come in? You know could have woken me up? And that you didn’t have to sleep in the vehicle?”

He answered her questions in order, smiling. “Late, I didn’t want to, and it wasn’t so bad.”

She considered him a moment, knowing she was also smiling. Finally she shook her head. “It’s so good to see you,” she said again, meaning it in a way that he couldn’t possibly understand. A thought occurred to her. “How’d you find me way out here? S.H.I.E.L.D give you a map?”

“Yeah. Several maps, actually. Topographic, infrared, a map of the country, a map of the province, a map of the county, a road map … so yeah, it was relatively easy to find you.”

She laughed, enjoying his wry tone. A moment later she remembered her current situation regarding Loki and felt her stomach drop in an extremely unsettling manner. There were several different ways the events of this day could play out and most of them weren’t good. But she had to keep pretending that nothing was out of the ordinary, because if she didn’t …

“Come on in,” she told him then, because she really had no other option. As she turned and made her way back to the house with Bruce following close behind, she sent out a silent plea to Loki: _please, please stay where you are. No games. Not with Bruce._

Because Bruce wasn’t just Bruce. He was also the Hulk. And she knew exactly what had transpired between the Hulk and Loki the last time they’d encountered each other.

She asked, because she had to, “No bags? How long are you here for?”

“Only the day, I’m afraid. It makes Fury nervous when I travel. The only reason I don’t have several S.H.I.E.L.D security details with me is because I told him I was coming to see you for a very short visit.”

At the door, she turned to face him with her hand on the knob. “Fury tells you what to do?”

“Fury makes suggestions. Sometimes I follow them. Most of the time I don’t.” He flashed her another smile and shrugged before going on. “I wish I could stay longer, Jane, but Fury did make a good point. The longer I’m here, the more at risk you become. I’m sorry.”

She reached out and placed her hand on his arm, feeling a sense of gratitude so strong that she could feel tears gathering in her eyes. That Bruce cared was a remarkable, wonderful thing—she desperately needed at this moment to feel like she had a friend an ally.

“The fact that you’re here at all has made my day,” she said sincerely before opening the door.

**.x.**

She gave Bruce as close to a thorough tour of her home as she could. To not do so would seem strange. The door to the guest bedroom remained closed, with Jane explaining that she used it as a place to store all her things that were still unpacked from the move. Bruce accepted the explanation as easily as she’d hoped and prayed he would.

In the kitchen, he sat at the table while she went about making them both breakfast. He accepted the coffee she offered gratefully and sat with his fingers wrapped around the mug as though to absorb its heat. Out of his bulky winter coat, he was wearing layers—she could see the collars of at least two other shirts under the collar of his outermost sweatshirt. It made her smile. When first she’d arrived here, she’d been in layers all the time too.

They talked of trivial things as she peeled and sliced potatoes into small chunks, adding chopped onion to the mix as it fried. In another, smaller pan she had a few sausages and two eggs cooking. As the kitchen filled with the appetizing smell of breakfast, as Bruce’s voice answered her questions and asked his own in return, she found herself falling complacently under the false shroud of normalcy. Abruptly she remembered Loki, sequestered away in the spare bedroom and undoubtedly able to hear every word they said. She felt her appetite fade away, but continued cooking all the same. It was imperative she give nothing away.

Once the meal was done she joined him at the table. As they ate he quizzed her about living in a country so thoroughly in the grips of winter, how much it differed from what she’d known, and how long it had taken her to get used to it. As answered candidly, it suddenly occurred to her that there was genuine interest in her tone. As foreign as it all was, as far as it was from places she’d previously thought of as home, this house and this little parcel of land had somehow become dear to her.

At one point, a thought occurred to her. “Why didn’t you call me, once you’d landed? I could have come and picked you up from the airport. You flew into Calgary?”

Bruce nodded. “I wanted to surprise you. I seriously underestimated how long it would take to get here, though.”

Jane smiled. “I _was_ surprised.”

“Then it’s mission accomplished, in a roundabout way.”

After the meal, they moved to the living room, seating themselves on opposites ends of the couch near the fire. Bruce, cradling the mug of coffee she’d made in one hand, let his eyes roam throughout the room, taking in the cedar walls, the wood-burning stove, the furniture, the bookshelves crammed full of titles of all genres, the stray pieces of art she’d put up. “Cozy,” he said appreciatively.

“I think so,” she replied, her eyes following the path his had just taken, roaming over all the little things that made this her home.

She asked him then about the Avengers, curious to know what was happening in the lives of Earth’s guardians. Bruce talked at length about each—excluding Thor— and entertained her a great deal with detailed accounts of Tony Stark’s recent scandalous exploits and Nick Fury’s subsequent ire. Jane, her eye straying upon occasion to the digital clock in the satellite receiver, was both surprised and saddened at how quickly her time with Bruce was passing.

“A part of me would like to ask you about how your work is progressing,” he admitted to her suddenly, stretching his legs out in front of him. “The other part thinks you don’t really want to talk about it.”

“I don’t.” Her tone was mild but firm.

“There are some things we _do_ need to talk about, Jane.”

The new solemn inflection in his words gave rise to an odd, unwanted sensation in Jane, extreme reluctance mixed with panic. Panic because she knew what he wanted to discuss. Panic because she knew Loki would overhear. Panic because she’d tried so hard to keep him from knowing about _this_.

As though aware of Jane’s inner turmoil, Bruce’s expression softened. Carefully setting his now-empty cup down on the floor next to the couch, he turned and leaned toward her. “I’m not asking to upset you,” he told her.

“I know that, Bruce.”

He was silent a moment, his eyes searching hers intently. After a moment he nodded and leaned back again. “Thor,” he said. “Have you heard from him? Have you seen him?”

As though from a distance, she heard herself reply, heard how terse and low her voice had become. “No. Not since …”

He finished her sentence, “Not since the first time?”

She shook her head.

A silence fell. Finally he cleared his throat. “So he doesn’t know what happened?”

Loki’s words resurfaced from her memory, mocking and cruel and heavy with truth. Jane felt an unpleasant smile twisting her lips. “At this point,” she said, “I’m almost certain he does know. He has to.”

“Why? Have you had a message?”

_You have no idea_ , she thought. Instead she replied with, “No. There’s been nothing. But Heimdall watches over Earth. Heimdall is always watching.”

Bruce nodded slowly. During her time in the hospital and his subsequent visits, she’d explained to him all she knew of Asgard and all she’d seen when she’d been there. Another long silence fell. Jane, unable to bear the grave concern in Bruce’s gaze, focused her eyes with feigned interest upon the striped rug on the floor.

“He’s a coward.”

Jane’s head snapped up at the uncharacteristic sound of anger in her friend’s voice. “If he knows what happened to you—if this Heimdall _saw_ it—there’s no excuse for him not coming for you. There’s _no_ excuse. You were tortured because of him. You bled for him. When I found you, you were _broken_. There’s no other word for it. Jane, if Thor knows that you were—”

“He knows. He knows and he hasn’t come. And now I’m here and life goes on.” She’d raised her voice in her interruption. Still smiling that mirthless smile, she lied to him as she so often lied to herself. “Thor is no longer my concern.”

Another pause. She met his gaze steadily this time, recognizing the compassion in his earnest dark eyes. “You really mean that,” he said finally.

“I do.”

“What if he comes back?”

Even though he’d just given voice to a very real fear she harbored, she shrugged. “I'll deal with it,” she said simply.

Again she was subject to his scrutiny. When he finally spoke again, he did so with a small smile of his own. “Maybe you were right. Maybe I don’t need to be worried about you. That said, _if_ Thor returns, you call me. You let me know immediately. Alright?”

“What will you do?”  

“What he didn’t,” was all he said.

Jane swallowed hard at the knot that rose in her throat, at the prickling threat of tears in her eyes brought on by his words. Again she found herself wishing that she’d met Bruce at a different time in her life, before she’d been aware of realms beyond this one. He had a beautiful soul even with the burden of his alter-ego. Aware that if the tears spilled over things would become more than a little awkward, she cleared her throat a few times and spoke.

“Thank you. I mean it. You’ve done a lot for me that you didn’t have to do.”

“And I’d do it again and again.”

“I know,” she said softly, on the verge of losing her emotional battle.

Bruce saw and recognized the impending break. Swiftly he rose to his feet and beckoned her to follow. “It’s time,” he told her, “for you to show me around. Outside. Let’s explore this winter wonderland you were waxing poetic about earlier.”

Her gratitude at his kindness in the face of her distress was nearly overwhelming. Blinking hard, Jane got to her feet, throwing him a smile that held all the things she was feeling. “We can do that,” she said.

**.x.**

After Loki had delivered the news that morning of an unknown visitor, Jane had had the foresight to remove all of the things she’d purchased for Loki from immediate sight, throwing it in the spare room. His coat, boots, and gloves were subsequently nowhere to be seen. She found she’d wished she had them available when it came to the quandary of what to outfit Bruce in for an outdoor stroll. Even though he’d come prepared with winter boots, gloves, and a lined coat, he wasn’t accustomed to the cold. He insisted he’d persevere despite her voiced concerns, and so they left the house.

Outside she led him around the yard, pointing out her chopping block, the woodshed, the paths that led into the woods. The horses were back in the field beside the driveway and greeted the two humans in their friendly, food-seeking way. After that, Bruce and Jane walked down the drive and out onto the main road, bantering in the manner that friends do about all things inconsequential and light-hearted.

Jane loved every second of it.

When finally they returned to the house, the sun was hanging low in the sky. Bruce had held up well in the cold, his hands in his pockets and his hood pulled up tight around his face. They came to a stop beside his rental vehicle. Jane, glancing at her friend, couldn’t smother the laugh that left her. Bruce’s glasses were fogged over, his unruly dark hair made even more so by the hood, sticking out in thatches from beneath it. His cheeks and the tip of his nose were red. Knowing exactly what she was laughing at, he grinned in response.

“I think it would take me a while to get used to all of … _this_.”

“You know you’re welcome here any time, Bruce. I mean it,” she said, resolutely ignoring the facts that Loki lived in her house and that her life and the trickster’s were so intricately entwined.

“I’ll visit when I can. This is the first of many.” He’d removed his glasses to blow warm air on the lenses in an attempt to clear them; glancing up at her, he read her suddenly sad expression. He said gently, “I promise, Jane. I’ll be back.”

Unable to find words for how much she would like that, she just nodded. Bruce slid his glasses back on, checked his watch, and jammed his hands back in his pockets. “So … it’s nearly time for me to go. Flight leaves at midnight, and it’s a long drive back.”

“Thank you,” she told him, stepping up to hug him. He squeezed her back tightly, holding her for a long moment before she stepped away.

“Anytime. I was worried about you, you know?”

“And now?”

“And now …” He smiled. “And now I think you’re fine. Better than fine. This place agrees with you, Jane. I think you belong here. “

She realized that, at some point during his visit, she’d reached the same conclusion. As he moved to the door of his vehicle, she told him, “Drive safe. Up here, wildlife is thick. Especially on the roads at night.”

He nodded, opening the door to the SUV. “I will. Take care, Jane. Call me if you need anything. Anything at all, okay?” When she nodded, he got into the vehicle. “I’ll talk to you soon. I’ll call you once I’m back home.”

“Please do. Thanks again for coming, Bruce. I’ll talk to you later.”

He gave her a little wave before closing the door. As he started the vehicle she strode to the steps that led up to her house before stopping and turning to watch as he backed around, the snow crunching beneath the tires. He waved at her again before he steered the vehicle away from her house and down the drive.

Jane watched him turn from her driveway onto the main road and kept watching him until he was out of sight. She felt thoroughly deflated at the thought that he was gone. His presence had given her a welcome reprieve from the tense and unpredictable prison her life had become. He’d made her remember how it had felt to be normal. His departure brought her back hard to the unpleasant reality of the situation.

Turning, sighing, she walked up the steps toward the house.

**.x.**

Loki was waiting for her inside, as she knew he would be.

He watched as she shed her coat and boots, tucking her gloves into her coat pockets. Watched as she hung the coat up. Watched as she approached him with the intent of ignoring him entirely. As she made to pass by, however, he stepped directly into her path. With an inward, resigned sigh, she looked up to meet his eyes.

“My brother—was he worth it? Worth the torture? Worth the pain?”

His voice was soft, deceptively so. In his eyes she saw the now familiar glint of his anger, still burning low, simmering in the icy depths.

Realizing that this conversation was going to happen and that there was nothing she could do about it, she answered candidly. “I thought so then.”

“Even as it happened?”

His words prompted memories, long buried, to resurface with powerful vengeance. Jane closed her eyes tightly, shook her head, and breathed deep to banish them again, to make herself forget about _that_ pain and _that_ shame and _that_ helplessness she’d known so intimately. When she controlled those memories again, when she could open her eyes without seeing a monster’s face, she replied.

“No.”

“You knew then that my brother was unworthy.”

“Yes.”

“You pretended otherwise, all this time. Why?”

“I needed …” To pretend that he was. That there was a reason for what happened. That Thor hadn’t left her to the cruel, innovative ministrations of his enemy when he could have kept her safe.

Loki was relentless. “You needed what?”

“For it to make sense,” she told him helplessly, staring at him and entreating him to understand, to veer away from this topic and the hidden, brutal barbs it carried with it.

“Who was it? This enemy Banner spoke of, an adversary of Thor—who was it?”

She told him, the single word nearly inaudible, the hated, horrible memories battering at the worn barriers of her psyche as she did so.

His eyes widened. He made no move to stop her as she pushed roughly past him, seeking an escape from him, his words, his insistence on dredging up things better left locked away. He followed after a moment as she knew he would, shadowing her long, agitated strides as she moved into the living room.

“You were a pawn, Jane, meant only to lure my brother here, to Midgard. ”

Whirling on him, she snapped back, “I already know that!”

He caught her by the shoulders and she made to whip back around, to move away from him. “You do not understand. You could not understand. But now it is made clear to me. My brother is considerably more foolish than ever I imagined.”

“Foolish to let me suffer?” She asked, furious now. “Foolish to leave a mortal behind?”

“You,” Loki said. “He left _you_. Foolish, yes. Myopic in his loyalty to his father, to Asgard. Blind as always to the difference between duty and priority.”

His words, nonsensical to her, riled her to a new level of rage. She tore herself out of his grasp, twisting around and quickly putting the couch between them both. Watched as he followed her again with that same slow and careful tread he’d used the night he’d kissed her.

The night she'd let him.

“You see him now—the mighty Thor, Odinson—for his true self. You know the cleverly hidden truth Asgardians are so willingly made blind to. He was not worth your affection then, Jane. And he is not worth it now.”

She watched him approach, wild-eyed, unable to move or speak for the chaotic force of her emotions. His voice had become hypnotic, pitched low to soothe. “Can you better see now what it is I offer you?”

“You’d make me a pawn too, Loki! You’d use me to hurt him. And I know that _in a heartbeat_ you’d leave me behind just as he did. Because I’m mortal. Because I’m human. Because I was _his_!” The last words she spat at him, moving backward even as he moved forward, keeping the two of them in a steady cycle of advance and retreat.

And he said with perfect calm in the face of her fury, “I never leave behind what belongs to me.”

It was too much. It _hurt_ too much. Jane’s hands on the back of the couch clenched hard as she felt blinding pain race up her neck and along her jaw to explode behind her eyes, a white-hot flare of fury and anguish. She dropped her head, closed her eyes and concentrated simply on breathing, on holding the fragile threads of her being together while all around her the world strove to remorselessly unravel them.

When she opened her eyes, he was gone. She stood alone in the living room, holding onto the couch for support, unable to stop herself from replaying his words over and over again in her mind.

**.x.**

He greeted her the next morning as he usually did since the kiss. He was perfectly amiable. And Jane, gritty-eyed and feeling ill from no sleep, could only do her best to keep herself away, far away, from the combustible magnetism of his presence. She skirted him as he stood in the kitchen, fetching her own coffee before circling him widely, intent on escaping to the living room.

He made a noise as she stepped down from the kitchen, a strangled hiss of pain. Jane whirled to find him hunched over, one clutching the counter top for support, the other still holding a mug of coffee.

“Loki …?”

Slowly he straightened, bit by bit as though each minute movement was agonizing. Her next words of frightened concern died on her lips as she saw that the cup he held had shattered in his grip. Even as she watched shards of it fell loudly to the floor. Steaming hot coffee streamed over his fingers, following the broken bits of the mug as they fell.

And yet he didn't flinch from the scalding heat, didn't make a sound.

“Something … has happened.” His voice was husky, strained as he managed to stand fully upright. “… My brother …”

Realization hit Jane like a hammer to the gut. The obvious, sudden pain he'd suffered, the cup breaking so easily in his grip—

She was unable to mute the mewl of terror that crawled its way up her throat and spilled from her mouth. Even as his eyes found hers, as his fingers loosened to drop the remnants of the cup, Jane was already moving. Driven purely by instinct she bolted, dropping her own mug and racing for the door.

He was in her path immediately. He hadn’t moved. He’d _appeared_ , flickering into existence. Jane skidded to a halt, struggling for traction on the hardwood floor, hitting one knee but getting back up instantly. She twisted to the side and altered her frenzied trajectory—she needed to get to her room, to a phone—

An image of the baton appeared in her mind. If she hadn’t been completely infused with fear, she would have laughed at that sad, pathetic idea.

She hadn't even reached the hall and he was there again, shaping himself out of eldritch shadow. With the return of his powers his appearance had changed and he was clad once again in green and gold, a prince again. This time, Jane came to a shuddering halt and remained still. There was no way out. There was no escape. Loki the trickster was whole again.

 And Jane was just a mortal.

She watched him through wide eyes, breathing hard from her failed efforts at fleeing. Fully in possession of his powers, he appeared as he truly was, as he was meant to be—otherworldly. Dangerous. Deadly. Caught as truly as any animal by the hunter’s snare, she could only stand trembling before him as he approached.

“You are right to fear me,” he said, reaching out with one hand to touch her. His fingers found her chin, cupped it, tipped her face up so that all she could see was his face. His eyes, cold and brilliant, held hers captive with absolute authority.

“You tremble before me." His words were almost gentle as his other hand drifted upwards to trace the line of her shoulder, to slowly and purposefully glide over the column of her neck. She shut her eyes the moment his lips touched hers. He pulled back, only a little, and she felt his breath as a warm caress against her mouth as he spoke. “Open your eyes, Jane.”

She complied with reluctance, with fear, with anticipation so strong it was nearly crippling. He watched her with an intensity she could _feel_ as it hummed along every nerve in her body. He didn’t kiss her again.

She despaired to know that she desperately wanted him to.

Somehow, she found her voice. Somehow, she was able to form words with it. “What will you do?”

He smiled, the smile of Loki the prince, both radiant and sinister. “Return to Asgard. I must discover what has befallen my brother that this has happened.”

“And after,” he continued, his fingers now softly brushing over her parted lips, his eyes tracing a smoldering path in their wake. “I will return here. For you. We have much to discuss, you and I.”

_Please!—_ she wanted to cry, and simultaneously: _don’t!_ No sound left her. He stepped away from her then, his fingers slowly, gently falling from her mouth. She watched, unmoving, as a faint gold glow began to creep over his form.

“Soon,” he told her as it shrouded him entirely, as his features were obscured from her view by coruscating shades of gold. And then he was gone as surely as he’d never been there, the house a stark and empty place in light of his sudden disappearance.

It took long minutes before she could finally react. She moved. She headed down the hall, walking with a wooden gait, to her bedroom. Operating in a state of mechanical self-preservation, she moved from the closet to the dresser and back again and again until the duffel bag on her bed was full. It didn’t take her long to get what she needed from the bathroom, either. Didn’t take long until she was packed with everything she might need.

And then she was driving, away from the house, from her home. Fleeing another monster. Fleeing the perilous tumult he'd wrought.

Fleeing, too, how much she was drawn to him.

**.x.**

**_Sol’s Notes:_ ** _I apologize for the delay. This will likely be the last chapter until after the New Year. I want to thank everyone who has read and reviewed for their support and encouragement. It’s what keeps me going and I greatly appreciate your feedback._

_I’d like to wish you all a fantastic holiday season! All the best from me to you!_

 

 

 

 

 

 


	8. The Pointless Flight

 

**.8.**

Her first two days on the road, Jane drove with a single-minded purpose. She needed to put as much distance as possible between herself and the last place Loki had been. It was imperative. Never mind that Loki with all his powers returned was likely able to appear anywhere and anytime he felt like it. Never mind that he seemed to be able to travel between realms with intrinsic ease. If she remained constantly on the move, he would have a harder time finding her—or so she hoped. Because she didn’t doubt the certainty, not one bit, in his last words to her.

So she drove and kept on driving, heading east. Despite her heightened state of distress, she did so carefully. She was a cautious driver though not so much so as to be the slowest one on the road. She stopped regularly for breaks. When it came time to eat, she grabbed food from convenience stores or fast food restaurants, choosing swift convenience over nutrition. Outwardly, her manner was calm and collected. Inwardly she was a complete mess, a muddled mess of fears and desires.

The third day of her trip found her driving through Saskatchewan, a province that was as much at winter’s mercy as Alberta had been. She’d heard the jokes about Saskatchewan’s terrain, that it was so flat that you could watch your dog run away for days. It didn't seem much that way to her initially, her route taking her through country that gently rose and fell without great variation.

She didn’t like driving at night. So every evening when weariness began to drag at her senses she’d look for a place to stay. The first night it had been a roadside motel that was part of large, busy truck stop. She’d done the same the second night. The third night, however, she found herself in the city of Saskatoon. She navigated the streets carefully, aided by the GPS on the dash, finally pulling into the nearly full parking lot of a Super 8. The roadside sign indicated there was still vacancy, though judging from the amount of vehicles parked outside the motel they were very close to being at capacity. She could have chosen a lesser known motel with fewer guests but the truth was that she wanted to be surrounded by people even though she'd be staying alone. A part of her hoped that staying in crowded places would diminish the chances of Loki finding her.

A larger part of her, scornful and skeptical, was almost positive that no matter where chose to hide Loki would always be able to find her.

**.x.**

Her room was on the third floor. She’d forgone the elevator to take the stairs, climbing them quickly despite the weight of her purse and bag. Once in her room she secured both locks, crossed the room to the single bed, and dropped her luggage onto it. Her eyes went immediately to the phone on the bedside table and for a long moment she stood still, rendered indecisive by inward conflict. Finally she released out a loud, long sigh before moving to the head of the bed and sinking down onto it. It was another moment’s hesitation before she reached out and picked up the phone receiver, slowly dialing the number by heart.

“It’s Jane,” she said in reply to Bruce’s guarded one word greeting, no doubt brought on by the unfamiliar number she was calling from.

There was a moment of silence. “Where are you?”

Jane swallowed hard. Despite her resolution that this was the correct path to take, despite her resolve to make right all the wrongs she’d brought into existence by sheltering Loki, she was still fighting a near overpowering sense of uncertainty. Dragging Bruce into this couldn’t rectify what she’d done. In fact, dragging Bruce into this could lead to an entirely new chapter of Bad Things. But she had no other option. Alone, against Loki the demi-god, she was absolutely powerless.

“… Jane?” Bruce’s voice, suddenly concerned, prompted her to clear her throat and speak.

“I’m … on the road.” Her words were husky; she hadn’t spoken much in the last three days.

“Where? You didn’t say anything about taking a trip when I was there.”

 _I should have._ “Bruce …” She swallowed again, a painful reflex against the knot of fear in her throat that had taken up permanent residency after Loki’s most recent declaration. “There’s something I didn’t tell you. There’s a lot of things I didn’t tell you. About … about Thor. About Asgard and—and Loki.”

His name fell hard and heavy from her lips. In that instant she saw him again, his fingers on her skin, his breath on her lips and she could picture perfectly the heat that had flickered and flamed in the glacial blue of his eyes. She shook her head, banishing the vision. Tried unsuccessfully to banish the surge of emotions—panic, terror, desire—that accompanied it.

Bruce, knowing instantly that something of grave circumstance had transpired, said only, “Tell me.”

And so she did, the words spilling from her mouth disjointedly, detailing to him all that had happened to her since that day the conduit had touched down in the woods outside her home. She said nothing of what she felt for Loki, omitting his offer, his declaration, the ways he’d touched her. Bruce listened in complete silence, not interjecting or posing a question, until she finally stopped speaking.

“ _Why_ wouldn’t you tell me this, Jane?”

That was a question she couldn’t even answer to herself. “I don’t know,” was all she could say.

“You realize what this means? You know Fury will want you here immediately? Loki’s a war criminal, Jane. I understand why you did what you did. It was for Thor. But you already know you don’t owe him anything. Especially not if what Loki said is true. If he knew what happened to you and left you there …”

“Yeah,” Jane said heavily, knowing exactly where his train of thought was going.

For long moments neither of them said anything. It was Bruce who spoke next. “Where are you, exactly? I’ll have to alert S.H.I.E.L.D. They’ll want to bring you here, which is a good idea if you think Loki will return.”

“He will.”

“Where, Jane?"

“Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Super 8 motel.”

“You need to stay there. Don’t leave. Once Fury knows he’ll send people for you as soon as he can.”

Jane was shaking her head. “I can’t stay. I need to keep moving.”

“If Loki can travel at will between realms, don’t you think he’ll be able to find you just as easily?”

“I know that,” Jane whispered, willing Bruce to understand just how terrified she was, how disturbingly disconcerting it was to fear a man but crave his touch and his words despite that fact. “But I can’t stay. I have my mobile. You can reach me with it, okay?”

“Jane, please—”

“Call me after you tell Fury. Okay?”

She heard Bruce sigh, a sound of helpless frustration. She knew he was angry with her, had fully expected him to be. What she hadn’t told him wasn’t just an omission. It was a transgression that could result in dire ramifications not only for her, but for all of Earth as well. After all, Loki had tried to conquer the planet once before. Now that he’d regained his powers, what was to stop him from trying again? Yes, there were the Avengers, but Loki was nothing if not exceedingly clever. Jane was certain he could ascertain anyone’s weakness given even half a chance.

“I’ll call. Jane, be careful. Call me whenever you can. Keep me updated, please?”

“I will. I promise. Good night, Bruce.”

She hung up before he could say anything else. His voice pained her, the disappointment and the anxiety it housed within it. She was the direct cause. Bruce was one of the only people she held close to her now, for good reason. He’d saved her life. Afterward he’d held her together while she’d fallen apart. And then she’d gone out of her way to deceive him, to hide Loki’s presence. It was not a good feeling.

Nothing much of what she felt anymore was good.

**.x.**

She was on the road early the next morning, having checked out of her room before the sun had fully risen. Navigating her truck back out onto the streets of Saskatoon, she used her GPS to calculate a route out of the city. She’d been pushing east since leaving her house, switching to southeast after leaving Alberta. She planned on continuing in that trend. She didn’t have any idea where she was going. All she knew was that remaining stationary, sitting still, would drive her insane. It gave her too much time to think about Loki. It gave her too much time to reflect on the fact that she didn’t hate his touch and his words nearly as much as she should have.

She drove for hours in this new direction, altering her course only when the road design dictated she had to. Near sundown she switched directions again, heading east once more. She’d literally driven herself into a predicament. With the sun below the horizon there was no sign of a substantial urban center, meaning that her options were to keep driving through the night until she found a motel, or to pull over and try to sleep that way. She chose to keep going.

In an attempt to get back to a main highway, Jane decided to pull onto a network of back roads. Her GPS unit assured her repeatedly that this was the quickest way to get back to one of the central roads. Driving down a snowy gravel road in what appeared to be the middle of nowhere, Jane was not so sure. The moon was full and shone brightly overhead with a cold light. The austere lunar glow graced the thick and forbidding ranks of trees that lined either side of the road and hinted at the forested, gently rolling hills beyond.

She wasn’t tired. She wasn’t drunk. She was intently focused on the task of driving. The deer that leapt up from the ditch on the passenger side took her by surprise anyways. She yelped in panic, instinctively doing what you shouldn’t do on roads covered in snow and ice, slamming her foot on the brake. For one split second the deer was a silhouette in the headlights. In the dissection of the next second it was an object rolling over her hood, flying upward to strike her windshield—

 _—_ and then it was over, a dreadful cacophony of thumps before sliding over the top of the cab, hitting the side of the truck box and tumbling out of sight.  She had screamed when her truck collided with the animal, when first the realization struck her that impact was inevitable. Screamed still when it was over, a breathless cry, the blood of the doe an intricate road map lining the spider web of broken glass she stared unseeing out of.  Sucked in a fast, panicked breath as the truck lost all traction on the icy road, its trajectory wavering badly. Struggled to breathe as the vehicle, carried now beyond forces Jane could control, careened perilously close to the ditch, found she _couldn’t_ breathe.

Jane’s pounded on the brake with her foot. It was something she knew not to do, having learned as much by reading up on common driving hazards in winter climates such as this. Applying the brake only sent her truck into a dizzying, terrifying spin. The truck entered the ditch rear wheels first. And then the world came to an abruptly forceful halt before Jane was thrown forward hard and jerked back again as everything began to tilt swiftly to the right.

Time evaded her. When next she was aware she was on the road walking, unable, in a mockery of her vehicle, to maintain a straight line.  She felt no pain.  She knew she should and it bothered her on some level not crucial enough to matter.  What mattered was to keep walking, to keep moving, to keep putting one unsteady foot in front of the other. She did feel the cold, the wind biting with vicious ease even through the liners of her winter jacket. The tips of her fingers ached and tingled in the frigid air. She had gloves, but they were somewhere in the crumpled cab of the truck. She felt something hot trickling down her face, marking a wet trail through the creases near the corner of her eye. She knew it for what it was but pushed that knowledge aside and concentrated only on propelling herself ahead. Bloodied, torn, she trudged on with a focus that went beyond single-minded, a tatterdemalion beneath the unforgiving light of the moon.

Awareness of just why she had to keep moving returned suddenly, dazing her with its urgency. She stumbled as she moved, the world around her suddenly unwilling to stop its spiteful spinning.  She hit her knees a heartbeat later, the gravel biting into her flesh through her clothing, and pitching to the side she retched, an agonizing, spasmodic emptying of her stomach. Closing her eyes she heard a sound, a faint feminine whimper, and realized long moments later that the helpless, pathetic noise was coming from her. Her head ached with a violence she’d never known, a steady torturous pounding centered behind her right eye. Hesitantly, experimentally, she reached up to touch her forehead, wondering at the strange sensation she felt there. That one feather light touch polarized the pain in her head with vicious force and she was blinded by a surge of white so painful that she was retching again, over and over until she began to choke on the dryness in her own throat.

She remained on her knees, hunched over, until the agony in her head subsided enough that she could actually string thoughts together. _Loki_ , her brain kept reminding her. It took her two tries to get to her feet. Standing straight was a lot harder. Every time she blinked the world swam around her and nausea roiled in her stomach.

She became aware gradually of the fact that she couldn’t move her right arm. That it was broken was obvious. By the light of the moon she tried to see if there was any blood but couldn’t discern any dripping from her fingers or staining through the lining of her coat. _That’s good_ , she told herself, and determinedly took a step forward with the intention of going anywhere that wasn’t here.

The ground beneath her feet heaved. The sky realigned itself, the stars spinning into an intricate, circular blur. Jane felt disorienting waves battering her brain and tried hard, so hard, to keep upright. She couldn’t battle Fate. She couldn’t stop the will of the universe. With a last, desperate little cry, she dropped to her knees and pitched over into the snow.

The last thing she saw, the last thing she was able to comprehend, was the twin glow of headlights drawing near in the dark.

**.x.**

She’d heard people talk about the smell of a hospital, about how it was easily identifiable. She didn’t agree. The first few deep breaths she took as awareness returned to her didn’t alert her to her location. She remained oblivious until the moment her eyes opened to take in her surroundings.

She knew why she was here. She recalled fighting to regain control of her truck as it spun rapidly into the ditch. She remembered too, in bits and pieces, the struggle to get out of the vehicle after it had finally stopped moving. It had rolled once, landing back on its wheels, the cab crumpled and the passenger window broken. She remembered pain and confusion and panic. She remembered headlights.

She wasn’t in a room. She lay in a bed shuttered on all sides by a pale lavender curtain. From without she could hear movement, people moving to and fro and their voices as they conversed. She surmised she was in the emergency room. Her eyes dropped down, found that her right arm lay across her chest in a dark cast. She remembered parts of that, too, of a doctor telling her the break wasn’t bad but it still needed a cast. The doctor hadn’t let her sleep, either, insistent upon keeping her awake.

But she had slept, obviously. They’d let her drift off so apparently she’d be okay. She felt okay, surprisingly. She suspected she’d been given something for the pain. She also suspected that without that particular something, she’d be in a world of hurt.

The curtain where it hung near the foot of the bed was suddenly pushed aside. A tall, blonde woman in colorful scrubs stepped into the makeshift room, closing the curtain behind her.

“Awake, are we? I was just coming to get you up.”

Jane, still rendered off kilter by the events of the night, only nodded. The nurse approached the head of the bed with brisk efficiency, bending down to hold up a light into Jane’s right eye and then her left.

“Looks good,” she remarked. “How do you feel?”

“Probably better than I should,” Jane replied slowly. Her mouth felt odd, the words coming out stilted.

“You’re going to be uncomfortable for a few days, yes, but we’ll get you a prescription so it won't be too bad.”

“Who brought me in?”

“A married couple driving home found you unconscious in the road. They said you’d rolled your truck. They didn’t want to move you and make it worse so they called for an ambulance.”

“My truck …”

The nurse’s tone became sympathetic. “Totalled, they said. The wife grabbed your bag and your purse from the cab, though, so at least you have that. We’ll get them to you before you leave.”

Jane did feel a little better for that fact tiny fact. She watched as the nurse moved to foot of the bed again, grabbed the clipboard that hung there, and began writing quickly with a pen that hung from a lanyard around her neck.

“Now—Jill?—do you have any family here in Regina? Any friends?”

Jane wondered briefly as to how the nurse knew her assumed name and then remembered that her purse had been brought in with her. She then focused on the rest of what had been said and felt an odd sense of mingled relief and irony. Regina had been the destination she'd decided on earlier that evening before everything had gone to hell.

“No, I don’t."

“Hmm. Well, we can’t let you go on your own unsupervised. Need to make sure that you’re not concussed too bad. You’ll have to stay here overnight until it’s safe to let you go.”

Dread flowed through Jane, replacing everything else she felt. Staying here meant staying stationary. Which meant she’d be a lot easier to find. A protest rose in her throat. The nurse, glancing up and reading her expression, adopted an inquiring frown.

“I can’t stay here,” Jane said quietly, willing the nurse to understand the urgency and panic she felt.

“Sweetie, we can’t let you go unsupervised. Someone has to watch you the next few hours.”

“I won’t sleep,” Jane said with no small amount of desperation. “I’ll stay awake.”

The nurse shook her head. “I’m sorry, Jill.”

Jane took a deep breath and held it for a long moment, focusing on bringing her emotions under control. Falling prey to blind panic wouldn’t help her. It never had before. Freaking out in the emergency room and fighting with staff would only draw attention to her. She needed above all other things to be inconsequential, to be inconspicuous. When she could think again without feeling smothered beneath fear and alarm, she let out her breath slowly.

The nurse was still watching her. There was now a grim set to her mouth. She said, “Sweetie … is there—are you … we saw evidence of past breaks in your X-rays. You’ve got a lot of scar tissue as well. Are things okay for you at home? Is someone hurting you? Is that why you don’t want to stay here?”

Jane should have expected the deduction. Her body had in fact been broken and scarred. Swallowing thickly, she said, “No. I’m just running behind schedule. I need to be somewhere by morning.”

“Oh.” She could tell by that one word that the nurse didn’t believe her. “Well, where were you headed?”

Jane brought up a rough map of Saskatchewan in her mind, recalling what she’d seen from her road map. “Estevan. Down into North Dakota.”

“Well, you're a few hours away yet. Why don’t you just relax? You can’t go anywhere without a vehicle, anyway. And you’ll need to iron out insurance and all that before you leave, too.”

Jane, resigned, leaned her head back against the pillow as the nurse finished writing on the clipboard. Everything she’d said was true. Jane was effectively stranded here. All it would take was one call to Bruce and she was certain S.H.I.E.L.D would be here within hours to take her into protective custody. Although, considering what she’d done, she wasn’t all that sure “protective” would really play a part. Fury would consider her to be as much a criminal as Loki was.

The kicker was, sometimes she felt that way herself.

Jane closed her eyes. She was tired. She felt … battered. Not in pain—at least not yet—but in every extremity and along every nerve there was a sensation that let her know that when the painkillers wore off, she’d regret it intensely. She heard the nurse open the curtain to leave and then shut it again behind her. She shifted a little, finding a position that was comfortable, and ran her left hand over the cast on her right arm. She was effectively stuck. She had money, yes. She could call a cab and leave the hospital, but after that her options were non-existent. If the truck was a write-off insurance might cover it, but that process would take far more time than she had. Her only real way out was through S.H.I.E.L.D, as much as she hated to admit it.

She drifted for a time, her slumber uninterrupted by dreams. Every hour the nurse returned to rouse her and check her eyes. Jane said little during these visits and was always grateful to allow her eyes fall slowly shut again. In sleep she was free from all of things she had been so busy running from.

And so the night passed slowly. The fifth time Jane heard the telltale rustle of the curtain, she came slowly awake. She was thirsty and had already finished the water in the plastic cup on the rolling table beside her bed. She heard the nurse grab the clipboard at the foot of the bed. Jane willed her tired eyes to open.

To find that it wasn’t the nurse. It was Loki.

Disguises, she remembered then, were something he excelled at. He could wear another’s face or another’s body with the greatest of ease. He wore his own face now, though he was clad in light blue scrubs. Jane didn’t have to fight with grogginess or confusion to understand what this meant. The moment recognition jolted through her she knew with precise, pointed clarity what was about to happen.

He kept her waiting. She watched his eyes move as he read every piece of information in her charts. When finally he placed the clipboard back where it belonged every nerve in her body was singing with tension. His eyes made their way up her blanketed body, lingered on the cast encasing her arm before finally alighting on her face. She found she couldn’t speak. She could only swallow slowly, thickly, and wonder with the utmost trepidation what would happen next.

“You will always fight, won’t you, Jane?”

She wished she could say no. She wished life hadn’t made it necessary that she do so in order to survive. She said nothing, however.

“It could have been easy.” He walked around the foot of the bed, keeping one hand flat upon the sheet next to her leg. He stopped there, staring down at her with an expression that was alarmingly impassive. “You could have given way. I know what hushed desires you have immured away from all other thoughts. But even in this—which could be blissful, a release, a haven—you continue to fight.”

“Leave me here,” she implored him in a whisper that was nearly inaudible.

“There is some part of you that wishes me too, I know.” He took the two steps he needed to be standing at the head of the bed. He reached for her. She didn't move away. Told herself she couldn’t, transfixed by his gaze as she was. He cut through that particular form of denial that she threw up as a late, flimsy barrier between him and her heart and her soul and her mind. “The rest of you, though …”

 _That_ touch again. Fingers brushing feather soft over the line of her jaw, thumb following in the slowest, gentlest caress over her lower lip. He lowered himself to sit on the edge of the bed, positioning himself carefully as not to jostle her. Placed his hands flat on the mattress, effectively imprisoning her where she lay, though he was mindful not to touch her injured arm. She contemplated for the fleetest of moments crying out for help and knew that it wouldn’t matter. Loki had found her. And she had a suspicion that bordered on certainty that he meant to keep her away from all others.

“The rest of you craves what you know I can give.” His head dropped. Freed from the hypnotic pull of his gaze she inhaled sharply as she became aware again of the world without. Gasped again in sudden shock as she felt his lips on her skin just below her ear, that faintest of kisses nearly debilitating in what it did to her.

She remembered her courage, then. Reached up with her good hand—which, ironically, was the one that was missing the two smallest fingers—and shoved him in the chest with all the force she could muster. It was like trying to dislodge a boulder. He raised his head again and fastened his gaze upon hers once more. He shifted his weight, removing his hand from the bed and reaching for hers where it was centered on his chest. She let it fall swiftly, dodging his touch. In the next suspended moments between them she tried desperately to remember that he was the enemy, the villain, the monster.

 His other hand had begun to move and trailed downward, curving deliberately, possessively around the column of her neck. His thumb rested where her pulse beat a frantic staccato, conveying to him the depth of everything she felt. She’d tried then to avoid his gaze, afraid and unwilling to see what was housed there. The allure was too great. When his eyes captured and held hers again she found that she could scarcely breathe beneath their intensity.

She found her mind again, with great force of effort. Marshalled her resolve and corralled her thoughts into some semblance of normalcy. Found too her voice and mustered it, used it as the only tired, weary weapon she had left. “If I take what you give, what then? We use each other until we grow tired? Cast each other off and go our separate ways? The problem, Loki, is that I’m human. I’m mortal, as you’ve been so fond of reminding me. Once you’re done with me and me with you, I can’t just transport myself to another realm and forget about it all.”

“And I don’t know,” she finished in a voice that was soft and badly wavering as his head dropped again, as his lips hovered above her own, “if I could survive you.”

She’d made a concession of sorts. She’d finally given voice to what he’d already known, to what she’d tried to hide from him, from herself.

“There is much, so much, you do not know about me, Jane. I never relinquish that which I want, that which belongs to me.”

She almost said, _I’ve heard something similar from Thor._ She swallowed the words, forced them back—too late. He read it in her eyes. He straightened, lips twisting into a mirthless smile. She’d been afraid of his mercurial transition in moods before. She was terrified of them now.

“And still I’m living in the shadow of my great and glorious brother.”

She recognized the venom in his tone. Pitching her tone to supplicate, she entreated, “Loki, please, go. S.H.I.E.L.D knows you’ve been here—”

“Do they? Splendid. I have no wish to disappoint their expectations.” His smile had become viciously wolfish.

“Leave me and go.”

He shook his head, rearing back, raising his arms so that she was free again. “No, Jane. What’s written next involves both you and I. And I do not so easily concede defeat.”

She knew what he was referring to. Felt it roll through her in waves of anticipation mixed with alarm. Jane fumbled for the call button that hung at the side of the bed her free hand. Loki watched her unsuccessful attempts with an expression of cold amusement before he placed one hand on her shoulder.

The hospital vanished. Light enveloped them both, prismatic sprays silhouetting their forms. And between one blink and the next they’d both been transported. When the light faded and the world came into focus around her, she realized they were back in her house. It was dark. They both stood before the wood stove in the living room. The stove itself was dark, the fire long dead. Loki stood before her, his hand still on her shoulder. Without moving he was somehow able to bring the lights on. Jane blinked under the glare.

He let his hand fall. She took a step back and then another, stopping only when she felt the couch brushing against the back of her knees. She sank down onto it slowly, keeping her eyes on Loki, who’d watched her retreat without expression. He was garbed again in gold and green. He approached after a long moment and she watched warily as he knelt before her.

He said, “You will not run from me again.”

“If I do?”

“I will find you. Always.”

She glanced away, shook her head, confusion and frustration warring within her. She forced all her uncertainties and fears into one single word, “Why?”

“That,” he replied softly with a smile that was almost unhappy, “is an answer I do not readily have.”

“It doesn’t have to be this way.”

“It does.”

“Why?”

His expression altered. For the first time since knowing him, she recognized something other than imperiousness and self-assurance in his bearing. She saw uncertainty in his eyes. Swiftly he banished it, the flicker dying away almost as quickly as it had appeared. “You are mine, Jane. Mine to safeguard.”

He read easily the fears that swept over her, the way they touched her eyes and the lines of her face. “No, never will I be that. I would never take by force what I know you wish to give. What you still may give, in time. Despicable as you think me to be, I am not that.”

His words brought some measure of relief. His next erased that relief from existence. “I must go. I will return as soon as I can.”

He was going to leave her here, injured and alone? “Why?” She demanded, “Where?”

He didn’t answer immediately. Instead he reached up and placed his hands on both of her shoulders, too quickly for her to react. His head dropped, the long strands of his dark hair falling forward over his shoulders, obscuring his face from her view. She opened her mouth to question but stopped as she felt a faint sensation build from the point of contact beneath his hands. It was warmth, soothing waves of heat that radiated outward and down along her arms, through her torso, along the length of each leg. He was healing her, she realized as her broken arm began to tingle in a manner that was almost painful.

Seconds later he removed his hands. He looked up and met her wide-eyed gaze. “I’ve healed as much as I could. I must keep some power in reserve for my return.”

“Why? Why do you need it? What’s happening in Asgard?”

“War. I am needed. I searched for you in a lull between attacks, but I must return now.”

"Wait, Loki—"

"Are your concerns for Thor, Jane?" His smile was brittle, angry. The swiftness with which he altered moods was dizzying. "Does your heart ache to know he might be dead?"

All the panic, fear, and desperation she'd been feeling morphed into her own anger at his pointed attack. Because she hadn't asked the right question he'd decided to turn on her, to batter her with the brunt of his own insecurities.

"Thor," she said tightly, "is no longer a concern of mine."

His bark of laughter was mirthless, biting. "There is wondrous irony in that you mean what you say."

He was confusing her. He was also pissing her off. She got to her feet, rising into his space, forcing him to retreat a step, matching his glare with one of her own. She snapped, "I notified S.H.I.E.L.D. They'll be coming for me. They'll be coming for you."

"That is utterly unsurprising. You put in a call to dear Bruce, did you?"

"Damnit, _why_ , Loki? Why all of this?"

But he was shaking his head, still smiling that brilliant, bitter smile. "Time enough later for the hard answers, Jane. But I really must be going. I've an entire world to defend, armies to marshal, brothers to save …"

She was brimming with more questions, more concerns, with things she wanted to say but knew she couldn’t. She never had the opportunity to voice any of them, however. He took two steps back. She saw the same golden glow creep over his form as before. He said nothing this time in the seconds before he vanished. He didn’t need to. He'd already made clear his intentions. He'd come for her unerringly, no matter where she went.

She sank back down on the couch. She raised her injured arm experimentally and moved it in the manner the nurse had explicitly instructed her not to. She felt no pain, no sense of discomfort. It was if the injury had never happened. She’d have to find a way to remove the cast, somehow. But that was an inconsequential non-issue in comparison to the monumental repercussions of all that had just transpired and all that had just been said.

S.H.I.E.L.D would be here soon, of that she had no doubt. She considered rising and walking to the phone in order to call Bruce. He’d be beyond worried being as she hadn’t checked in like she'd promised she would. S.H.I.E.L.D would look for her here first before tracing her path as best they could using the information she’d given Bruce. She didn’t want them to come. She fervently wanted life to reset, to go back to the days before Loki had been sent to Earth, when she’d quietly and comfortably been enjoying a new life.

And even if S.H.I.E.L.D got to her first, Loki would find her again.  

 _Would it be so bad?_ she asked herself. Would it truly be so bad if she were to succumb to what she felt? She wanted him as much as he wanted her. She could admit this now, though it was an admission accompanied by no small amounts of shame, regret, and fear. But was it truly Loki she wanted or merely physical contact, pleasure and comfort and reassurance? It had been more than a year, nearing two, since last she'd seen Thor. She'd been alone for most of the time since.

But he was _Loki_. By his own admission he was a murderer. He'd brought the power of a hostile alien army to bear on Earth. He'd killed numerous people without discretion. That she would fall for the promise of his words, that she'd crave what he offered … what did that say about her? Had she truly changed that much? Was she willing to forsake values and morals she'd once held to firmly just to know the trickster's touch?

Jane had been changed, irrevocably and severely, by what she'd endured at the hands of Thor's enemy. She'd known it as it was happening. She'd known it afterwards. She'd lamented the loss of self she'd experienced. She'd mourned the way old familiarities had shifted, becoming elements strange and frightening. She'd regretted intensely that she came to view old joys as trivial things, things that couldn’t keep her safe. Jane Foster had emerged from the chrysalis of strife and suffering a different woman.

She'd only just come to realize, in the aftermath of Loki's words and touch and kiss, how very different that woman was.

**.x.**


	9. A Parade of Faces

**_Sol’s Notes:_ ** _Thanks (again) to everyone who’s reviewed! Those of you who check in every chapter to let me know how you like it have no idea how much I look forward to and appreciate your words. Your feedback is a large part of what keeps me going. I can only hope you enjoy the rest of the story, too!_

**.9.**

It was easier not to think about Loki this time. Her mind, she speculated with a clinical sort of detachment, had finally reached the point where it couldn’t handle any further fear, uncertainty or sorrow. It had shut itself down temporarily, a very convenient coping mechanism. Sitting on the couch in her living room, staring into the darkened heart of the wood stove, Jane mused on the fact that she really didn’t feel anything at all. It was harder not to think about what would happen soon, when S.H.I.E.L.D finally arrived. Fury’s wrath would bring with it harsh repercussions for what she had failed to do, even if Bruce tried to intervene. And given the increasingly erratic pattern and scope of her most recent decisions she wasn’t so sure her friend would want to.

After a time, she decided to focus on issues she could control. The first on the list was removing the cast from her arm now that it was no longer needed. Rising, she began to move through the house, her gait surprisingly steady and controlled. In the coat closet in the porch, in a bag of tools on the floor, she located what she had wanted: a pair of tin snips she’d found in the outside shed not long after moving onto the property.

She then chose the kitchen counter as her workspace, laying her offending arm out flat while she pondered how to proceed. Manoeuvering awkwardly with the tin snips in her left hand, she began the very slow and arduous process of cutting through the fibreglass.

Which is how S.H.I.E.L.D’s agents found her not twenty minutes later, after the door was kicked in and they had poured into her house shouting her name and Loki's. No longer holding the tin snips, in the process of carefully extracting her arm from the loose fibreglass shell, she looked around at the barrels of five different handguns pointed in her direction and realized what she’d both expected and feared was true.

Jane Foster was now a criminal.

**.x.**

She was tired. After they’d swarmed through her house like armed, efficient insects in order to determine if Loki was there, they’d handcuffed her and trundled her into—what else?—a nondescript shiny black SUV with tinted windows. She’d shared the back seat with an impassive female agent that Jane was vaguely familiar with—Maria Hill. Jane hadn’t asked where they were going. She knew it didn’t matter. She’d passed the time staring out the window and watching as they drove away from her home. She was somewhat surprised that rather than heading east they were heading northwest, further into the foothills. Gradually the heavily forested hills gave way to the snow laden crags and peaks of the Rockies. Unable to find anything else in her life that would give her even a modicum of tranquility, Jane gladly focused on absorbing their stark, haggard beauty.

They hadn’t driven long, less than two hours by Jane’s estimate. When finally the vehicle had stopped Jane had been assisted out of the vehicle—it was difficult for her to get out on her own with her hands cuffed as they were—and propelled forward by an unrelenting hand at her back. Their destination was a large metal door set into a black building with three stories and no outward hints whatsoever as to what its purpose was. Jane glanced around swiftly, attempting to get her bearings, and immediately noticed that they were within a huge fenced-in compound, complete with rolls of razor wire. Looming with wild imperiousness over the compound were the blue-grey shadows of the mountains. She hadn’t really been all that surprised, because of course S.H.I.E.L.D. would have a secret complex hidden deep within the Canadian Rockies.

She’d been taken to a small room with only one door, a chair, and a table. The handcuffs were removed. The agent—Maria Hill—had deposited two items on the table, casting Jane an unreadable glance before turning and leaving the room, closing the door behind her. Jane’s attention had immediately focused on what sat on the table. It was the same duffel bag she’d packed when she’d fled from Loki along with her purse. It seemed they’d had a team trace her movements to Regina, after all.

Jane had checked her purse to ensure all things were intact. Grabbing her phone, she saw she’d missed several calls and texts, all from Bruce. Her throat tightened at the thought of her friend. If he was here—and she had a sneaking suspicion he was—he was almost certainly going to be privy to whatever interrogations awaited her. Even though she’d appraised him briefly of what had transpired over the past couple months, he didn’t know it all.

And she didn’t want him to.

**.x.**  

Nick Fury would have been a very intimidating man. Standing before him and an assembled group of S.H.I.E.L.D. members, Jane reflected on that fact with a detached sense of ease that was entirely out of place given the situation. Standing as he was, clad entirely in militaristic black gear with his arms folded tightly over his chest, the glare Fury was levelling on her was impressive in its intensity considering he only had one eye. In another time and another place, Jane would have felt cowed by Fury’s obvious ire. Having stood toe to toe with Loki during his numerous rages, however, she felt notably underwhelmed.

“Tell me _why_ exactly,” Fury was saying in a voice that would have intimidated even the most hardened of men, “you neglected to inform _anyone_ that Loki had returned to Earth?”

Jane deliberated for long moments before answering. Her eyes brushed over everyone in the room, those that stood and those sitting at a long table off to the side. Bruce was among the seated. So was Steve Rogers. This was less of an audience and more of a tribunal, a fact that made Jane more than a little nervous. It also made her angry, though she was currently keeping that emotion under tight rein.

“As I’ve already told you, I believed it was Thor’s wish that nobody know.”

“You _believed_? As in, Thor never actually told you?”

The emphasis Fury put on that one word set Jane’s teeth on edge. Fury had little time or respect for civilians. Jane was acutely aware that that’s all she was to him. Despite what she’d done, despite her own admitted guilt, his condescension grated on her nerves.

Her gaze had been wandering again, a nervous habit. She swung it back to meet Fury’s own, struggling to match his icy stare with one of her own. “No, Thor never told me.”

“Then why did you assume—”

“Why else would he send Loki to _me_?”

“It could have been a mistake. A miscalculated wormhole.”

His use of the erroneous term annoyed her, but she ignored it and replied with her own brand of withering sarcasm, “A hell of a mistake, wouldn’t you say? Sending Loki within less than half a mile of my home when you consider that he could have been sent anywhere else in the world? No, he was sent to me on purpose. I surmised the reason for that was that he wished to keep Loki’s exile secret.”

“Loki’s exile.” Fury exhaled loudly and slowly, his nostrils flaring. “Miss Foster, are you aware of what kind of things Loki is capable of?”

Jane felt an unpleasant smile curve her lips. “Very aware.”

Her unexpected reaction gave Fury pause. He considered her with his one narrowed eye for a moment before continuing. “Then you know that he’s not a nice man. He’s a murderer and a terrorist on a level we’ve never known before—intergalactic. And when he showed up on _your_ doorstep, you let him in and kept him hidden.”

Jane felt the control she had over her temper turn suddenly tenuous. “I didn’t _let_ him in. I left him where I found him. In the snow.”

“He found you anyway.”

“Yes.”

“And you never thought to—”

“Of course I did! You think I sat back and welcomed him with open arms into my home?” A memory needled at her, the vivid recollection of Loki lying in the snow below her, arms protectively raised over his face to protect himself from the blows of the baton. “I deliberated. I didn’t know what to do. I suspected Thor wanted him hidden. What Loki told me confirmed as much later.”

“What Loki told you …” Fury half-turned and glanced down at some papers that were laid out on the desk behind him, the reports that Agent Hill had put together after grilling Jane for hours the day before. “That he knew where Odin was. That if something happened to him, Odin would be lost permanently.”

Jane’s reply was a single terse nod.

Fury raised an eyebrow in mocking disbelief. “And you never thought for one minute that he might be lying?”

Jane felt her cheeks flush with the first ungentle stirrings of anger. “I know what Loki is. Thor told me. I saw what he did to New York. I was always aware that he might be lying. The fact of the matter was that Thor sent him to _me_. There had to be some truth in Loki’s explanation. I had no desire to be the reason that Asgard lost its king.”

“You might be the reason that Earth suffers a greater loss than that, Miss Foster.”

His barb struck home. Jane found to her great shame that she couldn’t hold his gaze any longer. She looked away, her eyes instinctively locating Bruce. His expression as he watched the proceedings was forebodingly solemn. Unwanted tears of frustration and rage began to prick at her eyes; Jane shook her head, inhaled deeply and straightened her back, returning her attention to Fury.

“I know that,” she said, her voice low and intense. “You think I haven’t realized that? Consider my position—I was fucked no matter what choice I made. If I turned Loki over to you I risked the life of Odin. And I chose to keep him a secret, and now he has his powers back …” Jane smiled again, bitter and angry. “I did what I thought best. I had no idea he’d regain his powers. I couldn’t know that. I assumed Thor would return for him. And he didn’t, and now I’ve put everything at risk.”

Her voice had begun to waver before she’d finished speaking. She paused, swallowed hard, and went on, “I’m sorry.”

Fury’s expression was implacable. “So am I,” he said.

**.x.**

They’d provided her with quarters. They weren’t large, nothing more than a small kitchen with an attached sitting area, a small bedroom and tiny bathroom. She was thankful regardless, even though she knew with certainty that this was meant to be nothing more than a holding cell. That belief was solidified by the fact that Fury had assigned a guard to be with her at all times. The only true privacy she had was when she was in the bathroom. Otherwise, there was a guard standing beside the door during every moment of the day. After four days she became familiar with their rotation. There were four of them, working 8 hour shifts. Keeping an eye on her. Keeping an eye out, more importantly, for Loki. Fury had asked her if she thought he would return. And she’d given him the most honest answer she could.

She thought boredom would drive her mad. The first day after she’d met with Fury, she’d spent hours sitting in uncomfortably cheap armchair she’d dragged over to the window. She’d give S.H.I.E.L.D that much, at least—the view from her quarters was breathtaking. It looked out over a small valley, shadowed for most of the day by the mountains that blocked out the sky. Between the dense clusters of trees, a small creek meandered from one end of the valley to the other.

Jane could and did appreciate the scenery. But after spending 10 hours staring at it, lost in the convoluted mire of her own thoughts, it began to lose its appeal. She finally turned to the guard and made an earnest request for a newspaper, a book, a magazine, _anything_. He listened to her stone faced, nodded, but made no move to call someone and relay what she had said. Defeated, Jane had flopped back into the chair and stared moodily out into the valley as dusk crept over the world.

The next morning when she woke up there was a new guard stationed at the door and a pile of magazines and newspapers situated on the small kitchen table. Jane was more than a little heartened. Her imprisonment had become slightly more tolerable.

**.x.**

On the seventh day, Bruce came to see her. She’d just finished eating her breakfast—two fried eggs, two pieces of toast, two slices of ham, brought to her on a covered tray by a different guard just like every meal—when the door had opened to admit him.

The food she’d just ingested instantly turned to lead in her stomach. She set the fork down in the empty food tray, covered it again, and pushed it to the side of the table. She flashed him a hesitant, uncertain smile. “Hello.”

He nodded at her before turning to the guard and speaking softly. Without a word, the guard opened the door and exited the room. Alone now with Bruce, Jane struggled to find something— _anything_ —to say.

She was saved from the effort. “They treating you okay in here?” He asked.

“I can’t complain too much.”

Bruce was having a hard time meeting her eyes. He was dressed casually in dark jeans and a gray long sleeved shirt. With his hands in his pockets he wandered through the laughably small space that passed as a living room, making his way to the window. He leaned a shoulder against the wall, peering out into the landscape of white and gray without. “I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner. Fury doesn’t want me talking to you.”

Watching him, feeling that awful ache of sorrow, she said softly, “I’m sorry, Bruce.”

He nodded again, the movement jerky. “I know you are, Jane.” He sighed and turned so that he was facing her, still leaning against the wall. “I know why you did what you did. What you said to Fury—you were screwed no matter what you did … you were right. But I still can’t understand why you wouldn’t tell me.”

He cut her off before she could reply. “Scratch that. I know why you didn’t tell me. I just … Jane, after what happened to you—and all of it because of Thor … you could have asked me for help. You didn’t have to do it alone.”

“Loki knows you. He knows your weakness. Even without his powers he’s capable of harm. What if I’d told you? What if he’d gotten around your defenses? What then?”

Bruce regarded her for long seconds, his dark eyes grave behind the lenses of his glasses. “I guess we’ll never know,” he said finally.

Once again, Jane felt shame flood through her. She dropped her eyes, unable to bear witness to what she read in his own. He was hurt, she knew that. He had thought he’d had her confidence. She’d proven him wrong.

This time, the tears weren’t so easy to control. The floor at her feet blurred in her vision. She lifted her head to stare at the ceiling instead, blinking hard in a furious struggle to keep them at bay. In an effort to keep herself together, she asked, “I’m going to jail, aren’t I?”

She heard defeat and sadness in his voice as he answered. “I think so.”

“Hiding a criminal applies even when the criminal isn’t from this planet,” she said in a bid for ironic humor. “Who knew? Although I suppose criminal isn’t really the right word for Loki. He’s a terrorist.”

“Yes.”

Jane propped her elbows up on the table and rubbed hard at her eyes, feeling then a gritty, clinging weariness beyond anything she’d ever known. There were no more words. There was only what she’d done and the desolate finality that awaited her.

“I could try to get you out.” Bruce’s voice was soft.

“Lots of guns and agents to go through.”

“It’s nothing the Other Guy couldn’t handle.”

Jane’s head shot up at his words and she twisted to face him. There was no trace of a joke on his face, no hint that what he was saying wasn’t serious. He meant every word.

“You couldn’t—”

“Why not?”

“ _Bruce_ ,” she breathed. “You can’t let him loose just to get me out of here.”

He smiled suddenly, an unhappy twist of the lips that served as an unwanted, unsettling reminder of Loki. “Jane,” he said, crossing the room to stand before her, pulling the other chair around the corner of the table and sitting down on it. “I don’t think you understand what’s in store for you. We’re not talking regular jail. We’re talking something much, much worse. You’re not only a minor criminal in Fury’s eyes. You’re a perpetual walking threat. You've been privy to information Fury considers more than top secret. You know all about the Avengers Initiative. You know about other realms. And you've harbored a wanted criminal from one of those other realms in your own home for months. As long as you’re on Earth, Fury will always consider you a risk on a global level. He’s going to put you somewhere very, very secure that is far, far away. And I don’t think I’ll ever be able to see you again, not without doing something incredibly drastic involving the Other Guy.”

Jane had suspected as much, but the urgency in his words twisted her stomach into knots. She's know the fallout was going to be bad, of course it was, but suddenly the future that loomed before her was terrifying, devoid of any reprieve no matter how small and insignificant.

Bruce kept talking, his words low and fast. “I can get you out. I can take you somewhere, anywhere you want to go.”

“They’ll hunt you too.”

Again, he smiled that smile that hurt Jane to see. “I’ve been hunted before.”

Jane finally lost her struggle to contain everything she felt. Tears spilled over warm, large drops, obscuring Bruce and the world around him. Jane wiped them away but was unable to stifle the small sob that left her. Blinking hard, she shook her head with her own sad smile.

“I won’t let you do that.”

“Jane.” In that one word she heard everything she’d suspected, everything he’d sequestered away, hidden from view because he was a _good_ man, because he didn’t want to confuse or hurt her any more than she already had been. It tore at her heart. More tears came, streaming in quick succession down her face.

“Jane,” he said again. “ _Please_.”

She wanted him to. She wanted him to get her out of here, to carry her beyond Fury’s reach. But the truth she had to face, the truth that neither she nor Bruce wanted to acknowledge was that there was no limit to Fury’s reach, not on Earth. She might escape imprisonment but she would never escape his search for her. As long as she lived she’d be a fugitive and so would Bruce along with her. And Bruce, who’d been hunted for so long, who’d been persecuted for all the reasons he couldn’t control …

She couldn’t do it. She wouldn’t.

Reaching up, she took his face in her hands. Studied with a kind of desperate sorrow the gentle lines of his face, the bold dark sweep of his brows, the warmth of his eyes framed by the thick fringe of lashes. And she found herself wishing so very, very hard that life had thrown them together in a different way. She could have loved him. She could have needed him and wanted him and _deserved_ him.

In another life. In a life that she’d never know, a life that was no longer possible for Jane Foster. Because Jane Foster had in the beginning loved the god of thunder, and then …

And then she’d fallen, in a brutal twist of fate so callous and cruel that she was certain that everyand any god mocked her, for Loki. Fallen not in love, but into some nebulous and chaotic state of craving him. Of wanting him. Of needing him, on some level so fucked up that she couldn’t bear to think about it—she _couldn’t_. Some part of her soul, warped beyond its original grace by what had happened to her, had sought him out. Had recognized him. Had forced her entire being into accepting this viciously reluctant realization.

She _ached_. She hurt for Bruce and for the Jane that had been, for the Jane she wanted so fervently to be. She hurt for what she was being denied, was hurt by what she was denying herself. Staring at Bruce through the sheen of anguished tears, she shook her head slowly.

“You deserve to be free,” she whispered.

He reached up, pulled her hand—the hand not whole—from his cheek. Cradled it tightly between his own. “So do you,” he said with a catch in his voice that shredded the remnants of her heart not already broken.

It would be so easy, so very easy, to give in. To accept his offer. She felt her resolve—such as it was, tattered and worn—began to fail. And so she leaned in quickly and pressed a hard kiss against his brow before standing, shoving back her chair and tugging her hand free. She escaped to the window and wrapped her arms around her body tightly. Fought with the urge to whirl around and leave with his other self, out of this facility and away from the grim, lonely future that loomed imminent.

“We can’t,” she said softly.

She heard him sigh, a shaky exhale. Heard him stand. Heard him take one step in her direction and then stop.

“If you change your mind, Jane …”

“I won’t.”

“Don’t make this decision because of me. I can survive. I have survived before.”

“So have I.”

There was a long silence. And then: “I’ll be back tomorrow.”

She heard his footsteps take him to the door, heard it open, heard the muted exchange between Bruce and the guard. Heard the guard enter the room again and take up his post beside the door.

Jane turned and reached for the armchair behind her. She dragged it as close to the window as she possibly could before sinking down into it and pulling her knees up tight to her chest. She stared unseeing out into the valley for a long time, no longer bothering to check her tears.

**.x.**

He didn’t come back the next day or the day after that. Jane, while acutely disappointed, wasn’t really surprised. Bruce’s alter ego may have been the Hulk, but that didn’t mean that Fury couldn’t stop him from visiting. The Hulk was a method of last resort, called to action when things were at their most dire. He was difficult to control and a tremendously unpredictable liability. Which is why Bruce’s offer had been so startling and had held such meaning. Jane suspected her room was bugged and was positive she was under video surveillance. If Fury had even the remotest indication of what Bruce had offered he’d make absolutely certain they couldn’t meet again.

And so the days passed. Jane, who had long ago read everything they’d given her, went over it all again. And then again. Her life consisted of reading, meals brought to her, the view outside her window, and the tedious, uninterrupted silence shared by herself and her four guards. She wondered why she hadn’t already been moved to a more secure location and realized that in essence, she was bait. Fury was waiting for Loki. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. alone weren’t going to contend with the trickster, but she knew for a fact that Steve Rogers and Bruce were here. Visualizing what would happen should Loki reappear here made Jane feel ill. She didn’t want to think about Bruce being forced into confrontation with Loki. She didn’t want to think about who she’d be concerned about more.

On the twelfth day of her confinement, things changed.

Most of her days she spent either standing before the window or seated in the chair in front of it. She’d spent so much time staring out at the valley that it felt as though she’d memorized every aspect of it. So when the day that had dawned bright and clear swiftly darkened, as the valley fell under thick shadow, Jane’s attention snapped immediately to the cause.

A mass of ominous clouds had gathered in the sky, roiling and growing as they circulated. Jane shot to her feet and took the two small steps she needed to be right at the window. Her good hand gripping the sill so tightly it hurt, she stared upward with wide eyes. She couldn’t see the conduit form—it was happening on the other side of the building—but she could feel it as it struck the ground with fury and force, causing tremors that rocked the building more than a little. She knew who had come. Loki moved from realm to realm through other paths by his own admittance. Thor relied on the storm to carry him.

Jane leaned her head against the pane of glass, closing her eyes. Thor had finally returned to Earth. She imagined him walking toward the secure entrance of the complex, imagined armed agents rushing out to meet him. Imagined Fury confronting Thor about the truth and the reason of Loki’s exile. Had she been wrong? Had Loki actually lied? Had his appearance in what basically amounted to her backyard been nothing more than chance? Would Thor’s explanation condemn her to life in prison for doing what she’d thought he wanted?

“No excitement in the face of his dramatic return?”

Her eyes opened at the sound of Loki’s voice before fluttering shut again. She didn’t need to turn around to know that the guard that had been with her all morning now wore Loki’s face. It worried her on some distant level to know that she wasn’t surprised or alarmed by this.

“How long have you been here?” She spoke with her forehead still pressed against the cold glass of the window.

“Hours only.”

“And Asgard?”

“Secure once again beneath the benevolent rule of my brother.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing more than the perpetual ebb and flow of power and greed. It all happened on a rather large scale, this time.”

“All instigated by you?”

She heard the amusement in his voice. “I cannot say I’m blameless.”

“So what now?” She laid her palms flat against the glass, tensing a little at the cold before pushing herself back and turning to face him. He was as she’d envisioned him, leaning with his arms folded against the wall, outfitted in the uniform all her guards wore. He looked as natural and at ease as she’d ever seen him, entirely capable of being comfortable no matter what role he adopted.

“Now …?” He lifted his eyes skyward and made a pretense of pondering. “I imagine Thor has gained entrance to this facility already, in spite of the fact that Director Fury is no longer certain whether he can be considered an ally. Despite the plethora of flaws my brother possesses, he excels at using physical intimidation to his advantage. He will have to speak with Fury first, of course. But after that he will make strong insistence that he be led here to you. After that I cannot _possibly_ predict what might happen, but I’ve a good guess. Do you?”

Jane also had a very good inclination of what would happen then. Thor would either validate what Loki had already told her or he wouldn’t. And she would either hate him for it, or …

Loki was watching her intently, reading her inner conflict as each emotion manifested itself in brief, flickering changes of expression. “Regardless of what my brother tells them, Fury will always consider you a threat for sheltering me. You know this.”

Jane, who had been making a pointed effort not to look at him, finally glanced his way. “I know.”

Loki pushed himself away from the wall and began walking a slow circuit around the small room. Glancing sidelong at Jane, he said, “I’ve seen where Fury intends to put you, Jane.”

She turned a bit to keep him in her view, sinking down into the chair by the kitchen table. “How …?”

“As I told you, I have been here for hours. Time enough to gain access to the innermost sanctum. Time enough to hide among Fury’s select inner circle and overhear plans being made. Where he wants to send you, Jane, there will be no coming back from.”

“If Thor explains the situation—”

“You’ve already acknowledged that Fury will never forgive or forget this transgression. The only way you will avoid lifelong incarceration is to leave.”

“Leave Earth,” she said, her voice hollow.

“You know it to be true.”

“With you.”

He paused in his pacing, turning to face her and clasping his hands together behind his back. Inclining his head slightly to the side, he replied, “I made you an offer. It stands even now.”

“Your offer …” Jane took a deep breath and released it slow. “You meant for us to be … lovers.” To her great dismay that one word came out strangled; she watched his smile flicker in and out of existence. “What if I—”

“We do not have the luxury of time to ponder certainties and absolutes, Jane. If you are to come with me, it must be soon.”

“Why are you being so …” As she struggled to find the right word, his smile manifested itself again in full. She felt her temper begin to flare up at the fact that he was so blatantly amused at her expense. “Before, you said you’d come for me. That you’d return for me. That I was …”

“Mine,” he helpfully supplied, smiling still and rocking back on his heels, looking in that instant like a casual acquaintance that had just dropped by for a happy chat.

Jane’s teeth ground together. Making a concentrated effort to unclench her jaw, she went on, “What’s changed?”

Even though she was used to it, even though she expected it, she was still startled by how quickly his expression altered, how fluidly he could transition from mood to mood. No trace of amusement now on his face, no carefree and easygoing demeanor. “Nothing has changed. All that I said I meant.”

“But you just gave me a choice?”

“If you desire to stay here and face the edict we both know Fury will issue, I will not force you to leave. But that eventuality is not for you, Jane. It could never be.”

She knew he spoke the truth but she mulishly clung to the faintest and flimsiest of hopes anyway. “But Thor could—”

“Could what?” Loki spread his arms out wide. “Could sweep in and carry you off with him as he has before? Take you back to Asgard and name you his ward?” He let his arms fall to his sides and shook his head, his expression one of mocking sympathy. “You could be nothing else, not in the eyes of the realm. Lovers, perhaps, for a time— _if_ still you wished it. But never his equal. Never his queen. And I do not think that you, Jane Foster, could ever live a life such as that.”

His words were exactly as he meant to them to be. Calculated. Biting. Cruel. All of the things combined that were so very Loki. Undeterred by the glare of unmitigated rage she leveled upon him, he continued speaking. “But perhaps you cling to the hope that my brother could negotiate your release, use his position as one of the … _Avengers_ … as leverage. Again, you deceive yourself. What you have done has marked you forever in the eyes of Nick Fury as a traitor to all humanity. He’ll only let you go if you no longer pose a threat to Earth. And the only solution that has a hope of satisfying him is that you no longer _be_ on Earth.”

“So,” he went on, approaching her one slow step at a time, “those are your choices, Jane. Remain and be imprisoned. Return to Asgard with Thor and know what it is to live always being regarded as something _lesser_. Or …”

Jane’s fury has faded as quickly as it had flared. With weary resignation she ran a hand over her face. “Where would we go?”

“Anywhere. Everywhere.”

She looked up and met his gaze. “You could do that?”

He smiled. “You have no idea what I can do.”

“And if I …”

The unspoken words hung between them as clearly as if she’d spoken them. “I would not force you.”

“But you'd still take me with you?”

“There are more worlds than you can imagine, Jane. You could live another life on any one of them if you so choose.”

Despite herself, despite everything, she felt the first faintest stirrings of excitement. Wasn’t it what she had spent so long speculating about—life on worlds beyond this one? What was there to regret leaving behind? Darcy, yes, but if she remained she would never see her friend again anyways, would never be able to see Bruce, either. To go to Asgard with Thor— _if_ he made the offer—would have exactly the same outcome. She would never be permitted to return to Earth. So why not take Loki up on his offer …?

_Because he’s a murderer! Because he can never, ever be trusted!_

But Jane easily ignored that inner voice—she’d had a lot of practice recently—and adeptly parceled it away into one of the most remote corners of her mind. Of the three choices she was presented with, there was only one that offered her any modicum of freedom. And above all things, Jane knew that she couldn’t live a life in which she was fettered.

She swallowed hard. In anticipation of what she was about to say her heart rate had increased. This was without question the most significant choice she’d ever made. She opened her mouth to voice her acceptance, but no words escaped. Instead, her voice was arrested by the sounds that filtered into the room from the hall outside. Both she and Loki turned as the door to her room flew open, propelled by the powerful hand of Thor.

Jane shot to her feet, the chair clattering to the floor behind her. Thor, his eyes sliding from Jane to Loki, came to an abrupt, startled halt. Behind Thor she saw other faces. Nick Fury. Steve Rogers. Maria Hill. And Bruce, whose gaze found and held hers and contained only fear for her wellbeing.

In the blink of an eye Thor was moving, leaping forward with his hammer in one hand, his intent clearly to subdue his brother. Loki was moving too; she felt him behind her, felt his arm snake around her waist, and had a sliver of a second to realize that she’d never really had a choice after all. Colors flared and merged, blinding her, and then the floor at her feet fell away. And then the only thing corporeal was the pressure of Loki’s arm around her waist and the solidness of his body at her back.

How long they traveled, she didn’t know. Her awareness had expanded beyond her capacity to understand. She knew only the stars as they swirled through her mind in a graceful, alien dance, knew only that her body was in motion, moving in every direction yet remaining tethered together by the most minute, subatomic bonds. When finally she regained physical form it was a harsh happening, rendering her mute and deaf and blind as she struggled to remember how to be human again.

Gradually, she became aware that she wasn’t standing. Instead she lay crumpled on her side, the ground beneath her uncomfortably uneven. As her senses returned she was overwhelmed by sound and sensation; her eyes remained tightly shut because she feared to open them.

“Breathe, Jane.”

Unable to do anything else, she could only comply with Loki’s directive. She breathed. Her body shook uncontrollably, a reaction in light of what had just happened. She was mortal. She was not meant to travel through the cosmos as Loki did, could never do it so easily. Every part of her being felt odd, felt out of place. Lying on the hard ground somewhere far from Earth, Jane began to panic with the sudden thought that perhaps she hadn’t arrived all in one piece.

“It will pass.” Loki’s voice was directly near her ear, low and soothing. As more of her physical awareness returned in fits and starts, she realized he was kneeling over her. She felt his arms— _thought_ she felt them—go around her, felt her body shift and tilt as he pulled her into his lap. Her eyes were still closed. She couldn’t handle a visual assault yet, not when all her other senses were threatening to overwhelm her sanity with their discord.

Jane kept breathing, inhaling deeply and exhaling slowly. She couldn’t control the tremors, but she could now feel and recognize most of her body. She concentrated on the sound of Loki's voice. “I was forced to carry us farther than I had originally intended. I meant to accustom you to this method of travel slowly, in smaller leaps. What you are feeling will pass in time. You need only relax.”

His advice sounded better than anything else she could come up with. So she focused then on the simple, soothing rhythm of breathing. Eventually she became aware of his touch, the slight, gentle caress of his fingers through her hair. The shivers that wracked her form slowly began to subside, leaving behind only a bone deep sense of exhaustion. Cradled in Loki’s arms, lulled by his soft touch, she felt sleep begin to pull at the edges of her consciousness. In an effort to fight it off, she made a gamble and opened her eyes.

Loki’s face filled her vision, the familiar icy hue of his eyes as he gazed down at her a strangely comforting sight. His hand stilled in its motion when first she stirred; it resumed a heartbeat later, his fingers tracing light paths through the loose strands of her hair.

When she spoke, her voice was nothing more than a hoarse croak, her mouth and tongue and teeth still feeling utterly alien to her. “Where?”

Loki raised his head to glance around. “Nidavellir. The Dark Fields. Home of the dwarves of Hreidmar.”

Jane tried to turn her head to look around and immediately abandoned that movement as waves of dizziness flooded her mind. “Are we safe here?”

Loki’s expression as he returned his gaze to her was unreadable. “Relatively. Safer than we’d be in Asgard, certainly, or Svartalfheim.”

Jane thought on that for a moment before another realization struck her. She was no longer on Earth. And if what she suspected was true she could never return to Earth, either. The thought struck her with a hard, sharp pang of grief.

Loki read it in her eyes and an unhappy smile formed on his face. “You regret leaving Thor.”

“No,” she said in a rough whisper. “I regret leaving my _home_.”

His expression softened somewhat. It appeared for a moment as if he would say something, but he pursed his lips together and looked away, scanning their surroundings. Jane closed her eyes again, unable to beat back the combined strength of sorrow and exhaustion. She no longer had a home, was a traveler now through the realms of the cosmos with only Loki as her guard. She felt an incredible sense of isolation. Loki was familiar with this type of existence. She was not.

“Jane.”

His voice startled her out of thoughts and she opened her eyes. He was looking at her again, his gaze so focused and intense that it momentarily stopped her breath. She knew before he began moving what would happen next and remained silent and still as his lips descended to touch hers.

It was a feather light touch, almost tentative and chaste. It confused her in the way it sent her heart skittering in her chest, in the way it made her want to reach up and grasp his face and kiss him _harder_. Obeying the whims she could only half suppress, her arms moved, lifting. And then she’d framed his face in her hands and he’d pulled back a hairsbreadth, his eyes a little wide, his lips parted as he awaited her next move.

She ran her thumbs over the elegant, defined line of his cheekbones. Studied his face with the intent to memorize how he looked in this moment, beautiful and vulnerable and unsure. He lowered his head again and her heart leapt, but she stopped him with her voice.

“Loki, please … give me time.”

He regarded her for a long moment, motionless. And then came that smile, that brittle, insincere smile that carried everything within it except what she wanted to see. She closed her eyes in dismay as he began to move, began to extricate his body from hers with icy detachment. She propped herself up on her elbows as he stood and stepped away from her, casting his gaze out over the world they now inhabited.

“We must move soon,” he said, and his voice was one of pointed disinterest.

Jane slowly shifted into a sitting position, resting her head in her hands as everything around her tilted alarmingly with the movement. “Loki …” she said softly, pitching her tone to supplicate, to soothe. She raised her head and looked to him where he stood.

He met her eyes. “It will be problematic for you,” he said, “should the dwarves happen to find us. They are notoriously unkind to those who trespass.”

She didn’t miss his deliberate wording. He was threatening to leave her behind. For a moment, lying in his lap with his breath warm upon her lips, she’d forgotten his true nature. Forgotten that he could slide from quiet passion to anger in the blink of an eye. Forgotten that he’d been without a home far longer than she had, that that fact had taken a toll on him. Forgotten that he was accustomed to always getting his way, and when he didn’t …

Jane, surprising herself, heaved herself to her feet in one quick and very unsteady motion. The world spun a little and then righted itself. Gritting her teeth, trying to ignore the fact that her body still didn’t feel like it belonged to her, she said, “Then let’s go.”

**.x.**


	10. Everything Foreign

**.10.**

Nidavellir, Jane found, was a world that commanded respect.

Anxious to keep pace with Loki, believing entirely that the threat he’d uttered had not been made in vain, Jane strove to regain command over her own body. He’d set a brisk pace which was an intentional decision, she was sure. Eventually her limbs began to respond without the shakiness that had overwhelmed her body and she felt more sure of every step she took. It was only then that she could remove some of her focus from simply keeping Loki in view and turn it to her surroundings.

The land around her was desolate, craggy, forbidding in its rough peaks and thick stands of conifers. The path Loki walked was not an easy one; large boulders and fallen trees littered the way, slowing Jane down considerably. There was a stillness similar to what Jane had known at her home, the absolute quiet of an empty wilderness. Daylight was muted by the heavy banks of gray clouds that hung overhead, so thick in places that some mountain peaks were entirely obscured from view. There was a chill to the air that carried with it the possibility of rain. Jane, clad only in the hooded sweater, jeans, and hiking boots she’d been wearing when she’d vanished from her room at S.H.I.E.L.D.’s base, found room in her crowded brain for worry over how exactly she’d fare in bad weather.

It didn’t take long before exhaustion tugged at her every movement. The process of traveling to another realm had worn her out. Striving to keep up with Loki had rapidly diminished what little energy she’d had left. Still she trudged on, with a grim resolution. He had brought her here without her consent. The fact that she’d been on the verge of giving consent no longer mattered. She was not going to let him leave her behind. But how could she stop him, a man that could leap from world to world as easily as he could go through a door from room to room? Jane was not at all oblivious to the fact that she was even more helpless here than she’d been on Earth. Her wellbeing—her _survival_ —now depended solely on Loki’s goodwill.

And currently, his goodwill was in short supply.

The route Loki had chosen initially had been uphill, winding through large chunks of rock and scattered copses of trees, on a gentle incline. Eventually it straightened out, much to Jane’s relief, before turning into a slight descent. Going downhill was easier on her tired limbs than marching uphill, and so she had more time to study her surroundings. Loki had led her into a depression, what she guessed to be the remains of an ancient stream bed. It was easier to walk here, with little in the way of obstacles. The trees, which had been growing in small groups originally, had gradually thickened into a forest around them. The only sounds that were audible to Jane were those of her own footsteps, as Loki ranged far ahead.

For a time, she simply focused on watching him. Watched as he walked, surefooted and confident, striding forth smoothly in areas where Jane tripped and faltered. He hadn’t looked back once since he’d begun walking. Jane’s earlier desires to know his touch had been replaced entirely by the desire to throw heavy rocks at his head.

The daylight was beginning to wane when the path dropped into a steeper descent. They’d left the stream bed behind and were treading now through the forest proper. The trees, ancient beyond her reckoning and high enough to rival the coastal redwoods on Earth, rose all around her like silent sentinels. When the path grew steep enough, Jane had to clutch their trunks for balance as she passed, inching her way downward and all the while trying to keep Loki in her line of sight. Loose clumps of dirt dislodged by her steps rolled down the hill at a velocity that was alarming. Jane began to move very carefully, her hands hurting from gripping tree trunks so hard, her legs burning from the amount of effort it took to control her descent. Eventually she became so focused on not falling and tumbling downward that everything else became an insignificant blur.

When finally she did fall—an inevitability, given the terrain and her weariness—she was startled when her momentum was halted almost instantly by Loki’s hands on her arm and waist. Dazed and breathing hard, her sweatshirt damp with sweat and her hair falling in loose tendrils about her face, she looked at him with mingled relief and anger.

“… thank you.” She forced herself to say it, hating that she had to.

He said nothing, but supported her still as she half-walked, half-slid to a place where the ground became slightly more even. The slope they’d just traversed ended suddenly in a cliff, and Jane was disconcerted to see that she stood only several feet from it. Tired, aching, she shook off Loki’s touch with an irritable shrug, unable to stop herself from glaring at him. His expression as he met her eyes was unreadable. He held her gaze for several seconds before turning and beginning to walk again, his path parallel to the cliff’s edge.

Despite her ire, she was heartened. He hadn’t let her fall and tumble off the cliff. He’d been aware of her, after all. Which meant, she was certain, that his coolness towards her was a result of his own anger, his disappointment that she’d hesitated in giving him what he wanted. He was still walking at a steady pace that she was hard pushed to match, but she was fairly certain now that he wouldn’t leave her behind. Of course, Loki was unpredictability personified. Assuming anything as far as he was concerned was likely a bad idea.

Ahead of her, he’d come to a halt. She could see that he was standing almost at the very lip of the cliff. As Jane neared, he half turned to watch her, but made no effort to begin moving again. Hesitantly she drew alongside him, her eyes moving from his face to the open expanse that yawned before them both. And then she caught her breath, astounded at what she was seeing. From the corner of her eye she was aware that he was studying her still, but her attention was fixated completely on what she viewed.

Where the cliff dropped away there was nothing but open space; what lay at the bottom she couldn’t tell as thick fog blanketed it from view. There was a dull roar that rose from that depth that hinted at a mighty, roiling river. Across the great chasm, rising up as though out of nothingness, was a fortress that was startling in its immense size. It took Jane several seconds to realize that the structure was hewn out of a mountain, that its every tower and wall and crenellation were made of the same ancient stone as the peak that loomed overhead. It dwarfed any castle still standing that Jane had ever seen on Earth, rising so high that Jane had to crane her head back to see it in its entirety. The walls and roofs that rose and fell were forbidding in their linear structure. The atmospheric austerity was punctuated only by the wavering orange torchlight that adorned the windows and walkways, small specks of warmth amid so much that was cold and unwelcoming.

“The main stronghold of the dwarves of Hreidmar,” Loki said at length, his words carrying into the stillness despite the softness with which he said them. “Beyond those walls, within that mountain, their city extends for miles into the very earth.”

Jane, unable to tear her eyes away from the architectural impossibility that loomed from across the chasm, asked, “Have you ever …?”

“Been inside? No. As I said, the dwarves do not receive visitors well. Or at all.”

Jane, feeling awed and insignificant and severely humbled, finally tore her eyes from the fortress. “Thank you for showing me this,” she told him earnestly. Because she knew, somehow, that this was not the destination he’d originally had in mind.

His smile was slight, fleeting. He merely inclined his head before turning. Jane, who’d returned her gaze to the view across the chasm, reluctantly stepped back from the ledge. Loki stood waiting for her a few feet away.

“I can’t go much longer,” she said as she neared him, feeling an aching weariness that penetrated every bone in her body. The words left her with no small amount of uncertainty. Would he leave her behind? She still wasn’t sure.

“The destination I have in mind is not much further.”

Jane’s relief was so intense that she was sure it was a tangible thing. Instead she nodded, and when he began to walk again, she was following closely behind.

**.x.**

When night on Nidavellir had fallen, Jane and Loki had taken shelter in what he explained to be an abandoned outpost of the dwarves, a remnant from a war that had transpired in eons past. Situated at the bottom of a very steep stone staircase carved into the cliff, it was really nothing more than a room carved into the rock face. Jane had proceeded down the steps into the outpost white-faced; though heights were not really a fear she had, the abyssal drop that loomed only a foot away was more than enough to render her terrified. She’d crossed the threshold into the outpost with a relief that threatened to spill over into tears of exhaustion. Instead she’d focused on breathing deep and keeping the panic at bay.

She watched as Loki manipulated a series of tiny stone panels set into the stone wall near the entrance, watched with not near as much astonishment as she should have had as a large stone slab on the other side of the entrance swung shut, effectively acting as a door. Immediately the outpost was submerged in darkness. She stiffened, feeling new panic push at the very edges of her mind. Knowing it was irrational, she resolutely shoved it back. Somewhere in the blackness she heard Loki moving; a few seconds later light blazed into being in the center of the room. Somehow, with the powers she was still trying to comprehend and know the limit of, he’d created a fire. It crackled and flickered within a circular indentation in the floor. He was crouched on the other side of it. He slanted a look up at Jane, the firelight painting his face with an intermittent glow. She read his amusement clearly and knew he’d been aware of her momentary panic.

In an attempt to regain some self-composure, she posed a question. “How sure are you that the … dwarves … don’t use this anymore?”

“Very.” Loki rose to his feet and looked around. “I have sheltered here and in other similar outposts during my visits on this world. Never before have they been occupied or shown any sign of recent inhabitation. They have long been abandoned and forgotten.”

“And you’ve seen them? The dwarves?”

“From afar. Even I know to respect certain boundaries.”

Jane thought on this, turning on the spot to survey the small confines of the chamber they both occupied. It was small enough that the fire cast light into all corners. Jane took a deep breath, feeling an unwelcome sense of enclosure. She’d never been good with small spaces. It wasn’t outright claustrophobia, but it was something similar.

A sound pierced the stuffy stillness that had fallen. It took Jane a moment to realize that it was her stomach growling. In a belated, ineffectual attempt to mute the sound she wrapped her arms around her abdomen. Loki, who’d dropped to one knee beside the fire again, glanced at her with a low chuckle. She felt heat suffuse her cheeks and hated it.

“I haven’t eaten since …” The indignation in her tone faded as she tried to figure out just how much time had passed since Loki had spirited her away from Earth.

“That shall be remedied shortly,” he said in reply, turning his attention back to the fire. She was irritated to see that his smile remained.

She watched him for a few minutes as another silence fell. With both hands he encouraged the fire to grow by means that Jane couldn’t fully fathom, coaxing forth larger flames that burned easily despite the fact that there was no fuel that she could see. When finally it blazed bright enough to meet his satisfaction, he rocked back on his heels and looked up at Jane where she stood.

“I will need to leave for a short time.”

“Leave where?”

He gestured toward the stone door with one hand. “Without. To find sustenance for us both.”

“How?”

“In the most traditional of manners, Jane.” He rose easily to his feet. “The fire will continue to burn. In my absence, I suggest you try to rest. We will continue on tomorrow.”

“Where?”

His smile was free and easy, completely alien for Jane to see. “Anywhere,” he said.

She said nothing as he strode to the door and manipulated the ancient lock as easily as she’d insert a key in a door and turn it. The stone slab swung open again, bringing with it a rush of chill night air from without. He paused on the threshold, casting her one last glance before stepping outside. A moment later slab swung shut behind him, sealing Jane within.

Her gaze dropped from the door to the fire where it burned stable and high. Even from where she stood some several feet away she could feel its heat. Her eyes moved to the door again, considering Loki, considering his words. Everything felt disjointed between them. She was used to his conversation, to the way he so effortlessly spun words and cast them at her in long, seamless barrages. The manner in which they'd spoken so recently was awkward, abrupt. From there her brain found new paths to concern itself with, considering everything else that happened to her in such a short span of time. Doubts pulled relentlessly at her. What if Loki’s assurances that the dwarves didn’t come here proved false? What if they stumbled upon her in his absence? What if Loki himself didn’t return?

She closed her eyes, feeling the familiar weighty pull of weariness. She could panic inwardly all she wanted, but she had absolutely no power to change any aspect of her current situation. Loki’s advice had merit; she _was_ tired. Even if she wasn’t safe here—and she very much suspected that to be the truth—there was nothing else she could do. She turned, took the four steps needed to be at the rough-hewn wall of the room, and sank down with her back to it. She leaned her head back and tried to relax only to find that the stone’s unevenness was not conducive to rest. After a few minutes of fidgeting and adjusting her position, she lay curled on her side on the floor, staring at the flames. Relatively comfortable, she watched the fire and allowed it to consume her thoughts until her eyes grew heavy.

It was the scent of something cooking that woke her. Her eyes opened slowly, blinking once, twice, as her brain interpreted the smell of food. Loki was crouched on the opposite side of the fire once more, holding a long branch skewered with several pieces of meat over the flames. As Jane stirred, Loki’s eyes flicked from what he was holding to her and back again. She shifted upright slowly, wincing as her sore muscles protested. Rubbing tiredly at her face, she asked, “What is that?”

“I have not a name for it,” he replied, rotating the skewer. “Though it is somewhat similar in appearance to the rabbits that inhabit your world.”

“How did you … go about it?”

One corner of his mouth quirked upward as he transferred his gaze to her. “Are you so sure you wish to know the exact method of its demise?”

Jane ceded that point to him with a quick shake of her head. Bracing herself with one hand on the wall, she got to her feet, wincing as various parts of her body voice their complaint, unaccustomed as they were to a strenuous workout such as the one she’d gotten earlier. She pushed away from the wall and moved to stand near the fire, her eyes on the skewer Loki held. The aroma of cooking meat had ignited in her a hunger she’d never known and she knew that if not for the sizzling of the meat and the crackle of the fire, the rumbling of her stomach would be more than audible. She lowered herself to the ground, close enough to feel the warmth of the fire without it being uncomfortable. Loki continued in cooking in silence, and after a while, lulled by the heat, Jane felt her eyes begin to drift close yet again.

“Jane.”

Her eyes snapped opened and she started. Loki had risen and skirted the fire and was standing at her side, skewer in hand. He sat beside her with the same easy grace with which he did everything, settling himself cross-legged. Without a word he held out the skewer to her, indicating that she eat from it. Hesitant, aware of his silent scrutiny, she took it from him. For a moment self-consciousness and hunger warred within her. The latter quickly won and she lifted the skewer to her mouth, tearing at the chunk of meat at the top. It was hot but not painfully so, and she chewed with the hearty enthusiasm of the truly hungry. Swallowing, she became aware of juices trickling down her chin. She brought her free hand up to wipe at them, casting Loki a sidelong glance as she did so.

His expression stopped her breath. His focus was centered entirely upon her with an intensity that made her heart skitter in her chest. There was a heat in his eyes that made it abundantly clear exactly what he was thinking, what he wanted. And what he wanted, she knew, was to consume her, body and soul, until she belonged only to him, always to him. She swallowed the last bite of meat, her mouth suddenly gone dry, and slowly held the skewer out to him. He accepted it without removing his eyes from her face. They traced a slow, deliberate, smoldering path over her lips before he returned his gaze to hers. Time hung suspended between them, a slow procession of seconds made potent by the strength of the desires that were almost tangible in the air. And then his eyes released hers and she looked swiftly away, taking a shuddering, inaudible breath.

She wanted him. She wanted him to want her. In the span of the past however many hours she’d been frightened, she’d been saddened, she’d been heartbroken, she’d been angry. And now, inconvenient and unneeded and unexpected, she was dealing with lust. Lust so strong it was nearly overwhelming. She struggled with it, with instincts she never even knew she had, keeping her eyes fixed firmly on the ever shifting flames of the fire. She was afraid to look at him, afraid to see that hunger in his eyes again. Of course she’d known what he wanted from her—he’d made it perfectly obvious. But for so long they’d both existed by different rules: he as mortal as she was, both of them bound by all the constraints of Earth. But things were no longer the same. He was a god again and she the mere mortal and Earth was nothing for her but a memory. So much had changed …

“Jane.”

Slowly, reluctantly, she turned her head to look at him. He was holding out the skewer. His expression was now unreadable. As Jane’s fingers closed about the branch he stood, tossing something down to her that he’d detached from his belt. She reached for it with her other hand, lifting it to see that it was a waterskin. It was heavy in her grasp, an indication that it was full.

“How—?”

“There are many abandoned outposts and supply caches littering these mountains. Some still contain supplies. I am familiar with more than a few that do.”

“Thank you,” she said, and he merely nodded before walking around behind her, heading for the entrance to the shelter.

She watched wordlessly as he worked the lock, as the slab swung open, as he stepped out into the night of a world entirely alien to her. For a long moment she did nothing. And then, out of sheer necessity, she raised the skewer and proceeded to eat what meat remained. She chewed slowly, thoroughly, without tasting what she consumed. When she’d finished, she washed it all down with a long pull from the waterskin, chasing it with a smaller sip before replacing the cap and laying it down on the ground behind her, a safe distance from the fire. She laid the skewer down alongside it before getting to her feet.

She deliberated for a time, her hands unconsciously tightening into fists at her sides as she stared at the entrance of the shelter. Finally, she made her decision and followed Loki’s path out of the shelter.

It was brighter outside than within the small room, and Jane’s eyes adjusted easily. Maintaining a wary distance from the cliff’s edge, Jane looked around for Loki. She found him standing at the top of the stone staircase, his back to her, his head tipped back. Pursing her lips, holding firmly onto her earlier resolution, she carefully climbed the stairs. He turned as she neared. She searched his face as she approached, but his features were inexpressive.

“Thank you again,” she told him, “for the food. And the water.”

“We both must eat. It was simply a necessity.”

She opened her mouth to acknowledge that fact, but he spoke first. “The sky, Jane. I think you may appreciate the view.”

Obediently, she lifted her eyes skyward and lost herself in what she saw. Three moons hung bright in the sky, two of them full and one a crescent. The cosmic canvas of stars was breathtakingly vibrant. Near the horizon was an ethereal, glowing arc created by what seemed to be Magellenic clouds. Everywhere there was the light of stars, strewn through the blackness like an errant handful of diamonds cast aside. It was a panorama so lovely and so impossible that it brought swift tears of disbelief and joy to Jane’s eyes.

They were both silent for a long time, their respective gazes riveted on the stellar canopy above. When Jane finally remembered how to speak, her voice was husky. “You can travel anywhere you want, through all of it?"

His voice was uncharacteristically hushed, as if he too were humbled by the visage the universe offered them. “If I am able to find a path, yes.”

She understood, then, some of the reasons that Loki was the way he was. The freedom and possibility offered by what she looked upon was beyond all her ability to comprehend. It was marvelous. It was unreal. It was something that stirred Jane on the most basic of levels, filling her with awe and hope. Riding that euphoria, unable to resist it, she turned to Loki and reached for him.

He turned as he felt her hand on his arm, an inquiry in his glance. And then she was moving into him, pressing her body against his, burying her face into the mixture of leather and fabric that clothed his chest. His arms went swiftly around her, holding her as tightly as she’d hoped and wished for. She felt his lips as they brushed against her hair and in answer she tipped her head back, inch by inch, so that his lips grazed her forehead, her temple, the line of her cheek downward, ever downward, until they finally found her mouth. She surged up, rising on the balls of her feet, feeling a sudden desperation to know his kiss as she hadn’t known it before. Her lips parted suddenly, willingly, beneath his own. His tongue slid against hers a heartbeat later in a sinuous, deliberate invasion and she made a sound low in her throat of unfettered, absolute want.

His hands had not been idle, lifting to frame her face and hold her firm beneath the onslaught of his kiss. And then one hand slipped free, sliding down so that it could wrap around her waist and pull her closer, until her body was tight against his. Any doubts she had about how much he wanted her were assuaged then, his arousal evident even between the layers of his clothing and hers. When finally they broke apart they were both panting, breath rising on the chill night air as small puffs of steam. Jane pressed kisses along the line of his jaw, her fingers tangling in the loose locks of his hair. He made a soft, deep sound before dropping his own head and then she felt his mouth nipping at her ear, tracing a searing path down the column of her neck.

“Loki,” she whispered, and this time it was not a word meant to halt him.

He’d lifted his head, nipped at her lower lip, before releasing her and stepping back. She watched him distance himself, her distress clear on her face.

“Not here,” he rasped, and she realized he was struggling with his control. “Though there could never be a more glorious background, a more appropriate background, it cannot be here.”

“Why?” Her question was soft.

His eyes on her face were heated in their intensity, and the sound he made was very nearly a growl of frustration. “This world is no haven. It is merely a stepping stone in our path. They will be here soon, very soon, and by then we must be gone. Jane—there are other worlds. And when I am certain they follow no longer, when I am certain there all pursuit has been abandoned, we _will_ continue this. Because there is nothing,” he told her in a low, heated voice as he stepped closer and tilted her chin up with one finger, “ _nothing_ that I desire more.”

He sealed that statement with one last, final kiss. Jane, breathless and dazed and struggling with her own control, stepped back, half-turned and raised her gaze again to the sky. She could find no words for a long span of moments. When she could, her mind had cleared itself of the haze of desire and practicality and logic had reasserted themselves. “They hunt us, then? Your brother’s people?”

Her choice of wording did not go unnoticed; from the corner of her eye she saw the swift glance he cast her way. “They do.”

“Because of Odin?”

Loki’s sigh was nearly soundless, but she heard it all the same. “Yes.”

Jane was silent, ruminating on that. Finally, she asked, “Will you ever set him free from wherever it is you keep him?”

She’d turned to face him as she’d asked the last question and watched as his expression became shuttered, as his eyes narrowed and his mouth compressed into a thin line. So familiar was she by now with his moods that she didn’t feel unease or panic. She knew he wouldn’t reply and he didn’t. Instead he turned and began to make his way back toward the stone staircase. Jane moved to stand at the top of the steps and considered him as he easily made his way down them, reaching the bottom and vanishing into the outpost.

She could still feel the lingering traces of his touch, of his lips on hers, and recalling the urgency they’d both shared in that embrace made her heart start to race. There was so much between them that was wrong, she knew that. But what could be right between them could overpower all the rest. She knew what he was. She would never forget it. But in Loki there was something that called to her, that ignited her, a similarity so convoluted that she still didn’t fully understand it. Her life had narrowed so quickly. Away from Earth, her responsibilities and priorities were far less than what they had been. There was only Jane and Loki, only survival or death. And out here, so very, very far from any home she’d ever known, she resolved to have what she wanted rather than waiting for Fate to maybe cast it her way.

She made her way down the stairs with far less grace than Loki had, cleaving to the stone wall, her eyes glued to the ledge that was far too close. Inside the outpost Loki was once again seated before the fire, drinking deeply from the waterskin. As she entered he replaced the cap and laid the skin in his lap, pointedly keeping his eyes trained on the fire.

Undeterred, Jane made her way over to him, sinking to her knees beside him. “None of it matters to me, Odin and Asgard and everything in-between,” she told him then. “Not any of it. Everything that used to matter I left behind on Earth.”

He turned his face to hers, the firelight creating dancing shadows that played over half his face. His expression was closed to her, his eyes cool. “And what is it that matters to you now, Jane?”

She opted for complete honesty. “Survival. I’m a human on a world not meant for humans. And I think that no matter where we go, it’ll be the same. I’m completely dependent on you to survive, Loki. I’d be foolish not to realize how precarious things are for me right now. As for the rest,” she continued, choosing her words carefully, “What matters is what makes existence tolerable. Enjoyable, even. It’s not enough to just _be_ , not anymore. And I think you know what I want by now.”

In the wavering firelight she saw the ghost of a smile, one of utter masculine satisfaction, flicker across his face. He was recalling, she knew, what had just transpired outside. “I do.”

“Then don’t. Don’t freeze me out.”

She watched his thoughts and emotions as they rippled across his features in rapid succession. She recognized frustration as it furrowed his brow, saw uncertainty in the way his eyes darted momentarily to the side. Loki was by his very nature a man who acted alone, who existed in his own perpetual state of wariness, of watchfulness, of scheming. He wanted Jane and she knew it; what he was having difficulty adjusting to was the _how_ of the entire situation. He was saddled with Jane now, at least for as long as he wished it, but she understood that this was something entirely new for them both.

“I would have chosen this even if it hadn’t come about this way.” She responded to his silence in the only way that she could.

His stare was penetrating, intense in its speculation. She met it head on, no longer having anything to dissemble about. Her truths were valuable now, no longer secrets to be buried deep and forgotten. Truths were what had led her here, with him. Truths were what would bring her what she needed in days to come.

She wanted to touch him. She wanted to kiss him. And situated this close to her, she knew it was what he wanted too. She saw it in the way his fingers clenched in his lap. But Jane also knew the risks of their current situation, knew it was beyond foolish to indulge when they were both anything but safe. And so she studied him intently for a long moment, allowing her eyes to linger on every detail of his beautiful face, of the way the firelight lit his pale eyes, of the loose tendrils of inky hair that fell to his shoulders. She knew then that her emotions regarding Loki would always be in knots. She craved him and still feared him; she knew the terrible facts of his past and yet still wanted, in some ways, to be an aspect of his future. Loki and Jane together would always be a paradox, a conundrum offered up the universe meant to be eternally confounding.

She felt tired again, the last dregs of exhilaration and desire having faded away. Knowing sleep was an imperative for her she sighed and rose to her feet. She walked around the fire to the opposite wall of the chamber, feeling Loki’s eyes following her as she did so. She turned and put her back to the uneven stone surface before sinking down into a sitting position, turning her attention to the fire.

Nothing more was said. Their bond was nothing if not tenuous and Jane was aware that for every positive reaction to what she said or did there were a multitude of possible negative reactions. It would take patience and firm resolve to navigate the troubled waters that loomed ahead of them both. She was surprised to find that she had no doubts, none whatsoever, that she was entirely capable of handling whatever came her way.

Sleep, when it came, was deep and uninterrupted by dreams.

**.x.**

When dawn came, Loki woke Jane by gently shaking her shoulder. She inhaled sharply and blinked fast, relaxing when his features solidified themselves out of the blurriness of sleep. He rocked back on his heels as she slowly sat upright, rubbing tiredly at her temples.

“I will be without,” he told her, and she nodded.

She rose stiffly to her feet as he left the chamber, locking her hands together behind her head and rising up on tip-toe in a stretch that hurt as much as it granted relief. The fire, she noticed, was no more and had left behind it no scorch marks or ash as any other fire would have done. She reflected on that fact for a moment, wondering at what other powers Loki possessed that she was not aware of. Remembering that he was waiting, she began moving, wincing a little as every step she took made some part of her body ache and throb.

He was waiting for her at the top of the stairs. She climbed them slowly and carefully, her eyes fixed firmly forward. As she neared him, Loki held out a hand and she took it gratefully, allowing him to assist her up onto even ground. The day had dawned much as the one before it had been; overcast and grey, fog creeping everywhere in thick swirls. Loki didn’t relinquish her hand, instead pulling her near. She didn’t protest but arched a brow at him in silent inquiry.

“We travel elsewhere,” he said by way of explanation, pulling her closer still.

She folded into his embrace easily, fitting herself against him as his arms wrapped around her. Beneath her palms pressed flat against his chest, she felt the stiff fabric of his clothing and the smooth, hard surface of his armor. He didn’t move, was absolutely still, and Jane had the sense that he was gathering himself, gathering his power, in preparation for what was to come. Unease began to trickle through her as she relived the state she’d been in the last time they’d traveled between worlds, the panic and fear she'd been assailed with.

“It will not be the same this time,” he said, his voice low and soft, his mouth beside her ear. “We do not travel as far as we did then.”

Jane nodded, but said nothing as she recalled how her body had felt so alien and uncontrollable when they’d first arrived on Nidavellir. Her fingers found the outer edges of his collar and tightened unconsciously.

He laughed, a quiet exhale of air that sent strands of her hair fluttering. “Be calm, Jane. I assure you that you will come through this in one piece.”

Striving for bravery when she suddenly felt anything but, she asked, “And if I don’t?”

She could hear his smile in his voice, “I will find a way to put you back together again.”

And then she felt his body tensing against hers, felt his power roll over her in a swift, tidal surge. Jane screwed her eyes shut and clung tight to him as the world became prisms of white and then splintered and fell away, thinking only that she fervently hoped he’d spoken the truth.

 

**.x.**


	11. The Compass Errs

**.11.**

Alfheim was a paradise.

They spent only one day there, but even that was enough to let Jane know that she would never again experience a place like this. It was a world of light and color. Their arrival placed them in an ankle-deep pool of water fed by a small yet powerful waterfall that cascaded from cliffs far above. The cliffs were gray stone shot through with veins of glittering silver. Jane had released Loki and taken a tenuous step forward, the water rippling around her feet. She didn’t mind that it was soaking through her boots, making her instantly uncomfortable. Even her earlier fears about arriving disjointed and out of sorts had vanished in the face of Alfheim’s beauty.

The water that she waded through was clear enough that she could see every tiny pebble, every large smooth stone and shell that lay at the bottom amidst pale sand. Small fish swam through the water as she moved, darting away from her with colorful displays of fright. The cliff face that framed the waterfall was covered in vegetation, in vines that were so vibrantly green that Jane marveled at the lushness. Flowers had bloomed from various vines, their petals large banners that caught the sun and reflected a prism of colors that shimmered in the spray from the waterfall.

Jane’s eyes moved skyward and she raised an arm to shield her eyes. There shone not one sun but two, one at its zenith and the other closer to the horizon on it setting arc. Her glimpse was brief, but as she dropped her gaze, blinking away sunspots, she was shaking her head in awed disbelief.

She turned to see Loki. He had moved, wading through the pool to the shore. Dense forest surrounded them on all sides, the trees huge with broad, majestic canopies. The colors of the leaves seemed to scintillate as they ruffled in the slight breeze, projecting impossible shades of blue and violet back at her. After casting one last glance at the waterfall, Jane turned to follow Loki out of the water.

“You planned our arrival for this exact spot, didn’t you?” She asked.

He was waiting for her on dry ground, watching as she stepped out of the pool. “I did. Though,” he added with a faint rueful expression, “I had not intended for us to arrive _in_ the water.”

The smile Jane gifted him with was dazzling in its earnestness. “This is … you have no idea how much I appreciate the things you’re showing me.”

He inclined his head at her open, honest gratitude. “I admit my motives are not entirely altruistic.”

Jane arched a brow, faking disbelief, enjoying this light banter between them that was still so new, so unfamiliar.

Loki’s smile was there instantly in reply to her reaction. He stepped closer to her, until she had to crane her head back to hold his gaze. “I confess to hoping for a certain _kind_ of appreciation…”

Jane’s grin was only visible for a fraction of a second before she put both hands on his shoulders and rose up to grant him a kiss. It was meant to be brief, a polite, teasing gesture. His hands centered on her hips immediately, grounding her, and suddenly she was lost again, adrift beneath the onslaught of his mouth on hers. When reality reasserted itself she was nearly clinging to him, her body tight against his, with one of his hands fisted in her hair. He lifted his head from hers and made a noise that was half laugh, half gasping breath. “If only I had known earlier the possibilities offered by securing your gratitude …”

Before she could voice a reply, he stepped back. His hand fastened about her arm and turning, he tugged her with him. “Much, much more to see,” he said over his shoulder, “and so very little time to see it in.”

Obedient under his touch, she followed.

**.x.**

From Alfheim they traveled to Muspelheim. It was a land of perpetual primal fury. From the sloping hilltop on which they'd materialized they watched as in the distance the earth was rent, as molten lava spewed up from within innumerable chasms. The rocky ground they stood upon trembled continuously, making it hard for Jane to maintain her balance. Clinging to Loki, blinking to see through air that wavered with heat and struggling to accommodate her lungs to the heavy, oppressive air, she understood that they were not to stay on this world. They’d come only so Loki could show her something.

With his arm around her, bracing her against him, he led them down the incline, a surface made rough and very uneven by the primeval reshaping of the earth. They walked carefully, stepping over ridges of black stone, avoiding large cracks riddled with jagged rock spears. When the ground finally evened, Loki pointed upward with his free hand. Jane followed the line of his finger and felt her eyes widen. Above them, wading through the fiery chaos as easily as she might walk through water, were creatures that defied all logic and reason she knew of. They were giants, their skin an ever-shifting hide of molten slag, towering to such a height that she knew they dwarfed in size anything that did or had ever existed on Earth.

“Fire giants,” Loki told her, having to raise his voice over the near-deafening thunder of the world all around them being torn apart.

Jane nodded, rendered mute. The giants, she realized after a moment, were fighting. The molten colossi were throwing themselves at each other, grasping and wrestling in movements that should have been slow and ponderous given their enormity. Instead they were quick and brutal in their motions, striking out so quickly it was difficult to follow. As Jane and Loki watched, two giants converged on another, pulverizing into dripping bits of rock and magma within seconds.

Loki glanced down at Jane. She met his look, uncomprehending of the smile that flitted across his face. He turned his head back to the giants below, opened his mouth and shouted. The noise shouldn’t have carried, but Loki was a demi-god. His voice erupted forth with all the strength of a horn sounding men to battle, and as it carried out over the hellish valley Jane watched with horror as more than one giant turned to face its origin.

“Loki!” She hissed as first one giant and then another began to move with alarming speed in their direction. She took a step back, pulling at Loki, but he remained firmly where he stood. He shouted out again, a booming, wordless cry meant to challenge, to tease. The ground they stood upon began to quake so violently that Jane was knocked to her knees.

“ _Loki!_ ” She screamed as the giants hurtled down the slope toward them, dislodging huge chunks of rock that also came rocketing downward. This close she could distinguish the vague facial impressions of the giants, the uneven gaping maws that functioned as mouths and the smoking craters that were eyes. Jane lunged to her feet to avoid being crushed by a rolling boulder and grasped at Loki’s arm, tugging him back with terrified urgency.

He looked back at her, his wide and fierce smile shocking her in what it signified: triumph, mischief, glee. As the world began to tremble so strongly that she could no longer retain her balance, as the giants loomed so close as to cast their cruel, ancient shadows upon them, Loki reached down, caught Jane by the upper arms, and hauled her upright. And then they were travelling again, their essences spanning the gulf between space and time, between stars and planets and everything in between.

When they materialized next in the midst of snow and ice, he was laughing, a sound of complete delighted abandon.

**.x.**

Jane slowly grew to know Loki as he truly was.

That he’d so obviously enjoyed provoking the giants of Muspelheim gave her great insight. One of his sobriquets among the Asgardians had been Loki the Trickster. He was not above mischief or jokes. There was a side to him that took pleasure in simple things, that did in fact look for the lighter side, the humorous side. After he’d spirited them both from the grasp of the fire giants, after he’d transported them both to a snow-covered plain on some world she didn’t yet know, he’d taken one look at her expression and began laughing even harder. Furious at how close they’d come to being stomped from existence by the fire giants, she’d balled her good hand into a fist and punched him in the gut. He’d doubled over, laughing still between pained grunts, holding up a hand to ward off any further attacks. Still enraged, she shoved him hard so that he toppled backward into the snow.

As she stood over him, hands clenching and unclenching at her sides, the tidal wash of fury and terror ebbing away bit by slow bit, she was reminded suddenly of the day he’d arrived on Earth. In that instant she could recall with perfect clarity how the baton had felt in her grasp, how she’d been sick beneath the weight of triumph and terror as he’d lain prone below her in the snow.

He was again on his back in the snow as she stood over him. He was chuckling still, his mirth being slow to abate. If he was having the same recollections she was he wasn’t showing it. When finally he quieted, he stared up at her through eyes that had become heavy-lidded.

“I rather enjoy seeing you above me,” he said after a moment.

Jane didn’t miss his true meaning. Color flared high on her cheeks as visions of just what could be between them flashed through her mind. Seeing her flush, knowing the reason, a slow smile of utter satisfaction spread across his face.

“Come, Jane,” he said, propping himself up on his elbows. “Bestow upon me compensation for services rendered.”

“You want compensation?” Her voice climbed an octave toward the end, incredulity and mirth lilting her words as all remnants of fear and anger vanished.

Lounging on his back in the snow, propped on his elbows, he looked utterly and perfectly at ease. “For showing you the fire giants of Muspelheim.”

“And nearly getting us both killed?”

“With privilege come inherent risks.”

She snorted a laugh and shook her head. Mockingly grudging, she took the two steps she needed to be standing right at his side. He leaned his head back and grinned lazily up at her as she mimed aiming a kick at his head. And then, in a flash of movement so swift it was a blur, he knocked her legs out from underneath with a sweep of one leg. With a startled cry she fell, toppling over so that she was sprawled across his body. Thumping him in the side with one fist, she attempted to right herself, disentangling her legs from his. He was still laughing at her, she noted, though when she elbowed him hard in the ribs he _oomphed_ in a very satisfying way.

Eventually she arranged herself on her knees beside him. The snow as it melted through her jeans was as cold as expected, but not shockingly so. She took a moment to scan their surroundings. They seemed to be on a vast plain. The lay of the land was flat for as far as she could see in any direction. And while it was cold, it wasn’t anything worse than what she’d known at her home on Earth.

“Where are we?” She asked, returning her attention to Loki.

He’d folded his arms behind his head, as though oblivious to his bed of snow. “Nidavellir once more,” he said. “Much further south, out of the mountains. But you are deliberately dodging the topic at hand. I still await my compensation, Jane.”

“I don’t know what you’re expecting for nearly getting me trampled to death.”

“Ah, but you cannot deny it was exciting!”

“Terrifying, actually.”

“The two are usually one and the same. Now, Jane—grant me what I am owed?”

Jane leaned over him, placing her palms flat in the snow on either side of his head. Her fingers twitched from the cold. Her hair, secured in a loose, messy ponytail, fell over her shoulder to brush against his chest. Her eyes caught and held his, noting the way his pupils dilated with her nearness, the way his breath hitched in his chest. “Your payment,” she murmured, her eyes dropping then to his mouth. A heartbeat later her lips followed their path, gifting him with a kiss.

Cold was forgotten. Circumstance was forgotten. For a very long time, the universe consisted only of the honest, conflicted promise of Jane’s mouth against his.

**.x.**

From Nidavellir they moved to Niflheim, a land of harsh and desolate splendor. The entire world, Loki explained, was cloaked eternally in snow. The cold was an assault beyond anything Jane had known even in the grasp of the Canadian winter, relentless in its attack. It only took seconds after her arrival for her to realize that death awaited her here; no Earthborn could survive this climate. She turned to tell Loki as much, jaw aching from how hard her teeth were chattering. She’d stepped away from him after the ground had solidified out of nothingness beneath her feet. He reached for her now, his hands cupping her face, and the words she’d been about to utter died before they escaped her mouth. Warmth flooded through her, originating from the point of contact between them. It reminded her of how he’d healed her in the way heat suffused her body, pouring along every inch of her skin and out along every limb. He kept her face framed in her hands until she no longer felt the cold, and then after delivering one quick ghost of a kiss, he let her go.

Jane marvelled at how she felt so comfortably warm in the middle of so much snow and ice. “How long will this last?” she asked him, wondering again at the extent of the powers he contained, wondering if she’d ever know their limit.

“As long as I do,” he told her. “Shall we explore?”

Her nod was emphatic.

And so he showed her what wonders he knew of Niflheim. They trudged through drifts of snow so high that they brushed at their thighs. Loki broke the trail with Jane following not far behind. It was surreal to know that the wind that blew around them should chill her blood, that the snow she ploughed through should soak through her clothing and make her bones ache. None of this happened. Instead, she walked cloaked in magical warmth, able to appreciate the deadly beauty of this hard, alien world.

Niflheim was the kingdom of winter. There were no forests where she and Loki tread, only a vast plain littered with dunes of snow. In the far distance rose peaks that were taller and more jagged than any that existed on Earth. At one point Loki paused in his trail-breaking and pointed off in one direction. Following his indicator, Jane strained her eyes to make out what it was he wanted her to see. Eventually she made it out. Rising even taller than the peaks of the mountains were two spires, towers of some fortress of unfathomable origin.

“What’s there?” She asked him.

“I know not,” he replied, his tone uncomfortably sober. “There are defenses near that fortress that even I cannot breach.”

Jane considered that for a moment and suddenly wondered how safe they were on this world.

“Safe enough,” he said, responding to her unspoken question.

They continued on.

For two nights they remained on Niflheim. Loki found them shelter in his typical unerring way, leading them through periods of blinding, blowing snow to another ruin from another race of beings Jane never before believed in. It was an ancient stone hall, built within the shadow of a miles-wide and miles-long escarpment. The pillars framing the staircase entry had long since crumbled, but the interior, huge and empty and echoing, was for the most part intact. Loki led her with easy familiarity through the hall proper to a small antechamber near the rear of the structure. Jane’s eyes struggled to absorb the architecture, the remnants of a culture long gone. Statues still stood on pedestals in alcoves lining the hall, depicting creatures that didn’t even exist in human myth. Artwork hung in massive frames, too faded to make out aside from small remaining splashes of faded color. And through it all, the perilous tendrils of Niflheim had intruded. Ice crystals lined nearly every surface, large drifts of snow lying where cracks in the outer walls existed.

In the antechamber, Loki conjured again fire from nothing. As he began preparing a small meal from foodstuffs they’d accumulated on Alfheim—fruits, greenery—Jane left the small room and wandered back out into the hall, intent on absorbing as much as she could before the time to leave came. This was marvelous. This was unbelievable. This was exactly what Jane had hoped for when she’d accepted that she had to leave Earth and instead travel to other worlds.

**.x.**

Days passed. Jane had difficulty distinguishing them. After spending two nights on one world, they would hop to another with a long or shorter day to night cycle. It became confusing, so eventually she gave up trying to keep track. It didn’t bother her, though she thought it might. It occurred to her suddenly that she was content with this new life, such as it was. She was a wanderer—in essence, a vagrant of the cosmos. And it was a revelation to her that she was profoundly at peace with that.

Loki, too, became more content. Or at least that was how it seemed. His powers again intact, away from the influences and eyes of any other living being save herself, he seemed utterly at ease. The bonds between them began to strengthen in small, subtle, powerful ways. He was alert always to her needs. He provided for her whatever she needed, often before she even realized she needed it. That he’d spent extensive time exploring each of the realms on his own previously was apparent. He found them shelter, food, and water with ease. He made a point to show her landscapes and structures that he knew would awe her. She wondered, early on, whether he would resent her for her helplessness as a mortal among realms meant for other, stronger races. It seemed to be exactly the opposite. And she realized, finally, that a large part of his contentment stemmed from the fact that he’d gotten exactly what he wanted. Jane belonged to him because he was literally her survival.

There were moments, though, that she realized he struggled with his new reality. Sometimes she would catch him watching her, a frown furrowing his brows. At other times she would find him lost in thought, and with his mind so occupied she would see expressions flicker across his face that worried her, anxious doubt and uncertainty. Her glimpses into his inner turmoil were always brief. He would remember himself and his façade would shift to that of the Loki she was more familiar with, assured and commanding.

The attraction between them never abated. It was a constant entity, a tension that existed between them both with a potency that could never be denied. She thought for a time that Loki might fight it indefinitely, regarding it as a potential weakness. He surprised her. During the day he was her guide, her provider, her protector. It was during the nights that he slipped free of all of those roles and offered her comfort and solace. It became routine for them to sit before the fire after they’d eaten, Jane reclining against his chest, his arms around her. They rarely spoke. When they did, it was usually Loki answering her curious questions about everything that was so new to her and so familiar to him. They were careful, both of them, to regulate their touches, to never lose grip over the tenuous control they both held over their own desires. Loki’s warning about being hunted rang clear in her mind always.

It was that warning that led her to ask a question one night that had been in her mind constantly. “How do you know they hunt you? Can they track you?” She’d asked him in a voice that was unintentionally hushed. For a long while, the only sound around them had been the gentle sizzling and crackling of Loki’s conjured fire while they sat, Jane in front of Loki, his chest solid against her back.

It was a moment before he responded. “I long ago discovered how to obscure myself from Heimdall’s vision. I travel unseen. I know they hunt us because it is the only choice left open to Thor. He will have seeded the realms with scouts, with soldiers. He will have alerted all those that Asgard is allied with. They will be looking for traces of our presence and they will be very, very adept at finding them. For us it is a matter of keeping ahead of those that search.”

Jane considered this. “You’ve been hiding our trail?”

He shifted behind her, leaning back a little, his breath tickling the nape of her neck. “As much as I can. Those that look for us have skills in hunting that far exceed my own.”

“You don’t seem worried that they’ll catch up to us.”

His laugh was slight, a small exhale. “I am not, Jane. We need only keep ahead of them until Thor calls off the search. And he will, eventually. He cannot spread his available manpower too thin. There are far more pressing matters that must be addressed in the interest of Asgard.”

 _Like adjusting to Odin’s continued absence,_ Jane thought. She said nothing, however, struggling to stick to her earlier resolution not to care about anything that didn’t directly involve her wellbeing. She was content to merely lean back against Loki and feel secure in his embrace.

**.x.**

Vanaheim reminded Jane the most of Earth, from what she was able to see of it. There were thick, expansive forests and an abundance of lakes that ranged from small to huge, dotting the landscape. As she and Loki made their way through the wooded terrain with a pace that was very nearly leisurely, the scents and sounds hit her with a sense of deja vu. She was transported to another time, shortly after moving onto her property in the Canadian Rockies, when she’d decided to explore the woods surrounding her home. The pang of homesickness she felt stopped her in her tracks, unexpected and unwelcome as it was. Earth was no longer her home, could no longer be her home. There was no room in heart for useless longing. She hardened herself and pushed it resolutely away.

The frequency with which they hopped between worlds was steadily decreasing. They were spending several days on each realm now instead of just a couple nights at a time. They’d revisited some of them more than once, always in a different location from where they’d arrived previously. Jane had accustomed quicker than she’d assumed she would to the life of an interstellar nomad. Still, she found herself longing more than one of the luxuries she’d had before. Foremost among those were the comforts of a mattress and the highly desirable convenience of a shower.

Loki had pointed out on each realm they visited sources of water that were safe to drink and use to freshen up. Jane had long been tempted to ask for the luxury of bathing, but always assumed that with Asgardians and the natives of each realm on the lookout for them, it was anunnecessary convenience. Now that it seemed pursuit had slowed, she decided the time was right.

On Vanaheim, after Loki had led her to a small lake that looked so very inviting to her travel-stained, somewhat bedraggled self, she posed her question to him. She’d predicted his response: eyebrows raised suggestively, a teasing and utterly seductive smile curving his lips. Her own response was just as predictable. Picturing him unclothed in the water with her made her heart misbehave, made other parts of her body throb with constrained lust. He read it in her eyes, his own darkening with desires that were so very similar. In the end they’d stood staring at each other in silence thick with want. She’d watched him struggled with what he was feeling, watched with no small amount of disappointment as necessity won out over need. He told her in a voice made thick from the strength of his desire that he would be nearby, keeping watch.

And so she bathed fully for the first time since leaving Earth, leaving her clothes in a heap on the lake shore, wading naked into clear and calm waters. She went about her business quickly, uncertain even with Loki’s assurances that they were safe on this world. More than once she glanced over her shoulder, both hoping and fearing to see Loki approaching. He did not, and so she finished her bathing feeling an aggravating mixture of frustration and relief.

When Loki did return some time later, Jane was again clothed, sitting on the dry sand a few feet from the water. She was barefoot, her boots sitting upright next to her folded and dirty sweatshirt. She’d rolled the hem of her jeans up so that her legs were exposed to the knee and was enjoying the sensation of a foreign sun warm and welcoming against her limbs. She’d just finished binding her wet hair back into a loose braid when she heard the sound of Loki’s approach.

Still sitting, she half-turned to watch him as he neared. He made no concessions to the warm weather, clad still as he always was in green and gold. He never seemed to suffer from an extreme in temperatures. Recalling the way he’d used his powers to warm her on Alfheim, she found it logical to assume that he didn’t need to. His otherworldly abilities seemed to extend even to the condition of his clothing; he’d been everywhere Jane had been, and they looked as clean as they had when he’d first appeared on Earth wearing them. Jane made a mental note to ask him to magic hers back into cleanliness.

“Feeling refreshed?” He asked as he neared, dropping easily into the sand next to her, stretching out his legs.

“Very,” she told him. “See anything of interest?”

“Nothing compared to what I wished to see.” There was a small note of mock plaintiveness in his words. Jane smiled, shaking her head, and transferred her gaze back to the lake.

The landscape was quite simply idyllic. The lake was calm, undisturbed by wind and reflecting back the image of the thick stands of trees that bordered it. Above, the sun shone unchallenged in the sky by any clouds. Bird calls sang out around them, reminding them that they were not the only living things on this planet. Jane, feeling more relaxed than she could remember feeling in a very long time, eventually laid down on her back with one arm pillowing her head and the other draped across her eyes to shade them from the sun. Lulled, she soon began to drowse.

Loki’s words brought her lazily back to awareness, “Jane?”

“Mmmm.”

“Is there truly nothing you regret leaving behind on Earth?”

She was a long moment in replying. Her brain didn’t want to think about Before. It wanted to dwell on Now. Still, she cast about sleepily for an answer, finally producing one. “I miss my home. It was the only home I really, truly felt comfortable in. I miss trivial things, like my books and my computer. I miss the Internet.”

And before she could think about the ramifications, before she could stop herself, she said, “And I miss Bruce.”

She was met with stony silence. Immediately aware of how she’d transgressed, she propped herself up on one elbow and looked to Loki, shading her eyes with her hand. “Loki, I didn’t mean—”

To her great dismay, the smile he turned on her was dismally familiar, a smile without mirth, cold and cutting. “You forget, Jane, that I was there. I was witness to you and Banner. I overheard the words you exchanged.”

Her dismay soured abruptly into anger. For all his confidence and power, Loki was profoundly susceptible to the lesser emotions like pettiness and jealousy. He was ill-equipped to deal with either. “I didn’t forget you were there. As far as I recall, nothing like what you’re insinuating happened between us.”

“But he wanted it to, did he not?”

Jane wished she could refute his words but found she couldn’t, recalling the revelation she’d had during her last conversation with Bruce. Belatedly, she struggled to mount a defense, “It wasn’t like that … Bruce was the one that rescued me from—”

“And in light of his heroics, his bravery, you never felt anything other than the most platonic of affections?”

Jane’s eyes narrowed. She shifted from her supine position onto her knees, facing him. Trying very hard to keep her temper in check in the face of his illogical ire, she said honestly, “No, I never felt for him in that way. Sometimes I wished I could.”

Loki’s eyes had become icy with his withdrawal, reminding her disconcertingly of the day he’d arrived on Earth. He glanced away and got to his feet. Hastily, Jane stood as well.

“Goddamnit Loki, there _were_ other men in my life. I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is. If this is going to work you’re going to have to accept it. And Bruce wasn’t one of them!”

“No,” he said, his voice deceptively soft. “But my brother was.”

Jane swallowed hard and backed a step. She couldn’t deny it, couldn’t even try. She wondered why now this was coming to light, why after they’d forged an undeniable bond, why after she was so sure that they would be able to make it work. And then she recalled those moments when she'd seen through the chinks in his armor, seen his worries and doubts. What she'd said had bolstered those uncertainties and he was lashing out on account of that. “Thor is in the past,” she told him.

“Would he have been, I wonder, if I had not taken you away?”

Jane set her jaw with grim resolution. If he wanted a fight, he was going to get one. “I already told you the answer to that.”

He was quiet a moment, his eyes fixed on her face. She read the turmoil there, the anger and the frustration. Understood that he was still wildly unprepared to deal with things the way they were. Understood that he was merely giving vent to that uncertainty in the only way he knew how. “I’m here with you, Loki. And it’s where I would choose to be no matter what.”

“How can I be certain of that?”

“You could _trust_ me.”

Loki made an aggravated sound, low in his throat and turned so that his back was to Jane. From over his shoulder came his next words. “You cared for Banner.”

She considered lying, knew he would be able to ferret it out. “Yes. He was my friend.”

“Did he make you an offer similar to my own? To save you from Fury’s untender mercies?”

Jane’s hesitation was as telling as her words. “… yes.”

“Would you have taken him up on his offer?”

“I turned down his offer. Before you arrived.”

He swung back around, his eyes unwavering upon her face, examining her expression for any hint of a lie. Jane met his stare directly with her own, challenging his accusations.

He said, “And if I had not taken you?”

“I’d be wherever Fury wanted me to be.”

“Thor—”

“Forget Thor!” Jane snapped, her voice rising as her temper slipped free of her tenuous control. “He’s not the fucking issue here. At least, not for me. But I’m not the one he’s chasing across the galaxy, am I? What exactly are you planning to do with Odin, Loki? Still holding onto that dream of being king one day?”

“Odin’s life,” Loki said slowly, precisely, “is serving as my insurance— _our_ insurance—against an order of execution should we be found.”

Jane’s found herself succumbing completely to her mounting anger. _How dare he?_ How dare he slip so easily into the familiar comfort of distrust and suspicion, now, after so much had occurred between them? “You’re a liar, Loki. I’ve always known that. Odin’s life is yours because it gives you an advantage over Thor and Asgard. It’s the only advantage you have left and you don’t want to let it go because if you’re not actively fucking someone over, you’re not being you!”

“And what do you know?” His words rapped out, growing louder and louder under the weight of his own fury, taking three furious, fast steps to be directly in front of her. “What do you know, little Jane Foster, a mortal out of time and space _because_ of me? What do you know about what I do and what I mean to do?”

“Deny it, then! Tell me you’re not still keeping Odin because you think you can use him to your advantage! Do you think Thor will hand over Asgard to you for the life of your father?”

“ _He is not my father!_ ”

Loki’s voice echoed all around, booming across the lake, terrible in its vehemence. He was breathing hard, having surrendered to the surging whim of the insecurity and fury and hatred that Jane knew he carried with him always.

“And Thor’s not your brother. So it should be easy enough for you to leave it all behind, move forward. But you won’t. So they both mean something to you. They must, if you aren’t willing to cut ties.”

“You know _nothing_!”

“Prove me wrong! Let him go! Asgard can’t be yours and you know it!”

She saw in his eyes, only for a moment, something she’d never seen before, a fleeting shadow of what she suspected was fear. It was gone almost immediately, replaced by a flaring anger so intense that it was nearly tangible. Her own anger ebbed enough for her to realize that she’d pushed him too far, for her to remember that she was no longer on Earth, for her to recall that Loki was her one and only lifeline. He was a demi-god, he was powerful beyond her comprehension, but he was also a man. And he was a man mired in emotions shared by Jane that he’d never known before, didn’t know how to handle. His initial outburst was caused by that, but she’d provoked him further, riding the heady, indignant rush of her own anger.

“So astute,” Loki said in a voice that had gone deathly soft, “at pinpointing the flaws inherent to my character. And so capable of ignoring your own. What is it within you, I wonder, that has you traveling through realms— _willingly_ —at the side of a terrorist, a criminal? And yes, a murderer, Jane. I’ve killed many without qualm. I would do so again if it were to benefit me somehow. There is your truth.”

“And you,” he whispered, reaching out and catching her jaw in an iron hold, his fingers intentionally squeezing her with bruising force, “are here. With me. _Willingly_. You have gone and misplaced certain elements of your humanity somewhere, dear Jane. You have gone and left your morals behind. But still you think to _lecture_ me, to instruct me on the right and the wrong when your perception of those facts is so greatly distorted!”

She cried out as his hold tightened, as pain radiated out through her jaw. And then he released her, backing a step as she tenderly rubbed with her palm at the places his fingers had been. He said, “We are both lacking, it would seem. I in the resolve that has served me well in the past, you in your conviction to be … whatever it is you were trying so hard to be. Crucial errors made on both sides.”

She knew what he was going to do, knew what weight his words carried with them. “Loki, please—”

“Should he find you first, express my apologies to Thor for yet again escaping his blundering efforts to hunt me down. And if he doesn’t find you, Jane … well, something else certainly will.”

His smile knifed through her as surely as any blade, a baring of teeth that was hateful, cutting. There was an element to it that pained her further, a bitter disappointment that she knew he wished he could hide, that she wished she didn’t see. And then he was gone, flickering from existence, and Jane knew that he was no longer on this world. He’d left her behind as easily as he had done every other cruel, malicious thing he’d done in his life.

Jane Foster, mortal, was alone on Vanaheim.

**.x.**

Emotion carried her back into the lake, the storming turmoil of rage against sorrow. She waded out until the water hit her knees before halting, grasping at her head with both hands as the reality of her situation struck home. She was alone. On an alien world. Without a protector or guide. And she had no powers, no skills to draw upon to ensure her survival. She’d been utterly, entirely dependent on Loki …

 _Loki._ A sound left her, a throttled sob that had knotted in her throat. Her tears were slow, furious, ugly. She’d trusted him. She’d known what he was—he’d pointed that out clear enough. Known him for a liar and killer and traitor. Known him for his capriciousness—had witnessed it first hand. And yet she’d trusted him. Wanted him. Actually had the naive foolishness to hope for a future with him. Had she forgotten his rages when they’d been together on Earth? How had she forgotten the fear he’d instilled her with, the distrust?

And it hurt her, _God, it hurt_ , to know that he was right to question just how far she’d changed, been warped, to fall for him. He’d made his point with all the force of a hammer to her heart. Jane Foster and her ugly, twisted soul had been the one to fall in love with a trickster god. She thought she'd made peace with that, in the way she'd changed, in how she felt. She'd altered enough to want Loki, to need his presence and his words as much as she wanted his body. And infuriatingly, agonizingly, she found she needed him still.

She waded further into the water, until it lined her thighs. Wrapped her arms tight around her middle and stared unseeing into the distance at the lake and the trees and the skies that weren’t from Earth. Struggled to calm the panic that was steadily rising with the intent to cloud her mind eternally. _I can’t do this_ , she thought, and at the same time a small part of her said evenly, _yes you can_.

He wouldn’t be back. She knew it as surely as she’d ever known anything. His pride was torn. His emotions would be ragged, such as they were—she was certain she was the closest he’d ever had to an actual relationship. He’d cared for her in his own way. And he would fight as hard as he could to distance himself from it, to regain the clarity that had served him so well before he’d been cast down to Earth.

Jane breathed deep once, twice. Narrowed the focus of the dissonance between logic and emotion in her mind until only one thing remained and mattered. Survival. She had to survive. She could survive, _had to_ , if only because she’d survived so much else. Clinging to that one thing that had more importance than anything else in the universe, Jane marshalled her newfound resolved and turned to head back to shore.

She froze immediately. Standing on the shore were three men. She assumed they were men, at least; their visages were hidden from view by fierce, inhuman masks. Feathers, fangs, and tusks mixed with black and white linear markings made their faces. They wore armor, primitive leathers adorned similarly to the masks. And they bore weapons, she noticed instantly, blades strapped to their chests and hips. Everything about them screamed hostility. Jane swallowed hard. It was her argument with Loki that had drawn them here, she knew. Their raised voices had carried through the wilderness, alerting these natives to their presence. And now Loki was gone and she was absolutely, pitifully alone.

One of the men—the one with the mask with tusks, took a step forward into the water. All three of them watched her in focused silence. When he began walking again, striding into the water with a purpose Jane didn’t care to know, she made her decision. There was no way out past them. Her only option was to escape by traversing the lake. She whirled around, the water dragging at her movements, and plunged ahead. She heard the sounds of pursuit from shore, the loud splashing letting her know that all three were after her now. As the water hit her chest she threw dove forward, beginning to swim. If she could outdistance them now, she stood a chance. Of course, if she exhausted herself in the deepest part of the lake she’d likely drown, but she knew instinctively that to surrender to them was to invite a dire outcome.

She set a rhythm quickly. She didn’t look back, couldn’t look back. Ahead was the only thing she could focus on. As she cut through the water with a skill born from a lifetime of loving to swim, hope soared in her chest. She _could_ do this.

Hands grabbed her. Jane screamed, twisted, kicked out blindly as she struggled to stay afloat. Her feet struck flesh and she heard a masculine, pained grunt. The touch fell away and she rolled over, intent on getting away. More hands on her legs this time—they were quick, these men, and as sure in the water as they were on land—wrenching her backwards, towing her back to shore. She fought hard, frenzied in her efforts, submerging herself in the process, inhaling mouthfuls of water that she choked on. More than once her foot or knee or fist struck home, more than once she gained her freedom. Always they recaptured her, with one of the men finally gripping her hair by its braid and using it to tow her through the water as she cried out in agony.

They got her out of the lake with quick, brutal efficiency. When she felt the lake bottom beneath her feet she fought again, tearing her hair free and swinging out blindly. A fist in the gut ended her struggle for a time as she doubled over and struggled to remember how to breathe. A kick to the backs of her knees send her sprawling to the ground. One of the men grabbed her feet and began dragging her through the shallows and up onto the shore. She writhed and bucked as she began to breathe normally again, fighting through the pain and the fear. One of the men not carrying kicked her hard in the side with such force that her vision momentarily went black.

When she could see again, think again, the man with the tusked mask was crouching over her. The other two stood conversing with each other in the background, their language sounding guttural, primal. Jane, greatly daring, rose into a sitting position. The tusked man immediately shoved her down again, hard. Jane rolled, attempting to put some distance between herself and him with the intent to bolt. Another kick to the side rendered her helpless and she lay panting in pain on her stomach. With deliberate purpose the tusked man placed his booted foot on the back of her head, forcing her face into the sand. _You are nothing_ , his unspoken message said clearly, _I am what matters now_.

Hands grabbed her by her shoulders, hauling her roughly off the ground. The other two men held her upright, securing her arms. The tusked man’s voice emanated from behind the mask, deep and husky while it issued forth words that made no sense to her. He stepped closer, lifting one hand to Jane’s face. His fingers, encased in a leather glove, caught her chin in a hold so very similar to the way Loki had touched her earlier. Jane closed her eyes and tried to twist her head out of his grasp. His fingers tightened, hurting her already bruised skin. His gloves smelled of leather, of earth, of other things she didn’t know. Her eyes opened. From behind the holes in his mask, she watched his dark eyes rove over her face and then down her body with what she could only interpret as appreciation.

One of the men lifted her bad hand, holding it up for inspection, prying her fingers open. The tusked man's gaze moved from her face to her hand and he reached out to touch the shortened nubs of her fingers with his own. What he said next was in words foreign to her, but the meaning was clear enough: _damaged goods_.

And in that moment, Jane knew what was going to happen.

The sound that left her was a cry that promised no surrender, a wordless sound of despair and defiance and fury. She threw herself backward, pulling at her captors, unbalancing them so that they stumbled with her. Gathering herself she surged forward, tearing one arm free, stumbling bodily into the tusked man, intent only on knocking him over, on taking him down.

The pain, when it came, was not unexpected. But it was different from the kicks and punches she’d suffered before. She sagged to her knees as the tusked man backed away from her, her eyes falling to where her good hand had come up to clutch at her ribs. There was blood there, seeping forth slowly between her fingers. With gradual dawning comprehension, Jane's gaze moved upward. In his left hand the tusked man held a knife, the blade coated in her blood.

**.x.**

 

**_Sol's Notes:_ ** _I apologize for the delay. This is getting harder and harder to write. The end is near, though!_

 


	12. Undone

**_Sol's Notes:_ ** _I apologize for my very long, very inconvenient absence. I had the majority of this chapter written before I lost any and all drive to finish it. I still intend to finish the story, hopefully sooner rather than later. Fortunately, there are only one or two chapters remaining. Thank you to all those who encouraged me to keep going and kept sending me their support._ _J_

**.12.**

For the second time in her relatively short life, Jane was certain she was about to die. On her knees in the wet sand, clutching the wound in her side and staring with shocked, dismayed awe at the masked face of her assailant, she’d was unable to think of anything except: _this is how it ends. Here. Not on Earth._ Seconds had ticked past. She felt her own blood trickle slowly between her fingers to land as scattered crimson beads in the sand. With every shallow breath she felt the hurt, a razor-edged flaring of pain between her ribs. Around her the world had become still and silent. The other two masked men stood on either side of her, waiting, she knew, for her to die.

And between one breath and the next all was undone.

The men were gone. Standing before her was Loki, regarding her with a gaze shuttered and cold. She made a sound of panicked inquiry—had he sent them away? Had he truly come to her rescue? And then reality struck—she could no longer feel the wetness of blood on her fingers—could no longer feel any pain at all.

“Illusion,” she said in a ragged voice as she struggled to understand the flood of events she’d only just undergone. That single word was part question and part statement.

Wordlessly, Loki nodded.

Jane felt her stomach drop at his confirmation. She realized instantly why he’d done it. Realized he felt no remorse for doing it, either. Licking her lips, swallowing dryly, she spoke again. “There was pain. I felt it.”

“There was no pain. You were not injured. It was merely your mind supplementing the reality you were presented with.”

Jane lifted a hand that trembled, ran her fingers over her lips, her jaw, feeling for the tenderness that should have been there from the blows to the face she’d suffered. She felt only the cold clamminess of her own skin, a result of her abject terror. The numbness was dying away, and replacing it came the slow, hot tendrils of fury absolute.

She said, “You left me here. On this planet. Alone.”

He shook his head. “I did not leave.”

Her chest rose and fell as she took deep breaths. She was going to choke on her rage. She was going to suffocate on it. She got to one knee and then stood, letting her eyes find anything to rest on except him. There was her hoodie, still folded some several feet from the water’s edge and beside it, her hiking boots. There were the imprints of her own feet in the sand. There were no other tracks. She’d truly been alone this entire time. Everything else had been a part of Loki’s manifestation.

She wanted to hurt him. The desire to slide a knife between his own ribs was so strong that she felt it in her teeth as she clenched her jaw so tightly it ached. Carried by the urge, she unconsciously took one step toward him. He watched her without expression. If he saw the fury in the set of her shoulders or her tightly balled fists, it was obviously of no concern to him.

“Night nears,” he told her, his voice as inexpressive as his face. “Come. There is shelter.”

He waited while she retrieved her boots, put them on, and picked up her hoodie. He then turned and began to walk. After a long moment, Jane followed.

**.x.**

She trailed after him with a gait that could only be called unsteady. She passed by trees and rocks and thick stands of leafy undergrowth. She put one foot in front of the other. The only thing she was clearly aware of was that Loki had made her think she was dying—and that he’d meant to do it to force her into submitting to his superiority. This was not what lovers did. This was not what anybody with even the smallest sliver of compassion or empathy or a _soul_ did to another person. This was wrong.

After a time, Loki halted. Jane came to a wary stop some several feet behind him, wanting to avoid getting too close not out of fear of him, but because of her desire to attack him some how. He turned and with the same lack of expression he’d had before, said, “There is a spring just down that hill, if you wish to drink.”

Her eyes followed his hand as he pointed in the direction. Wordlessly, she moved, stepping carefully down a small yet steep incline. At the bottom, surrounded by fronds of water lillies and aquatic grasses, was a small, clear, bubbling pool. Jane knelt before it, dipped her hands in and cupped them. She splashed water over her face and neck, blinking to clear her vision. The second handful she brought to her lips, drinking deep of it once, twice, three times. When she was done, she stood and shook her hands dry, feeling reluctant to turn back around.

When she did, she saw him standing above her, watching. He was always watching. She made her way back up the slope carefully, her foot slipping once as she neared the top. He reached for her as she tottered, only to jerk away as her head snapped around and she hissed a warning. Without his support she stumbled, three quick and uneven steps backward that brought her up hard against the trunk of a tree.

“You don’t touch me,” she said in a voice so low that it was nearly inaudible.

“Even if you’re falling?”

Sarcasm, arrogance, condescension—he managed to pack all three into that short, simple question. The enormity of the betrayal she felt was literally choking her, and it was all she could do to force the words out past it, “You will not touch me again.”

There was confusion there, flitting about the edges of the frustration that had lined his brow. And she understood in that moment that he truly didn’t realize how badly his illusion had affected her or how the fact that he could actually do such a thing shook her to her core. He was used to such manipulations. He was used to being obeyed.

It startled her, the tear that had escaped her eye and fled quickly down her cheek. In the act of raising her hand to brush it angrily away more escaped, flooding her vision. And suddenly it was hard to breathe past the sensation of falling, past the anger and the hurt. It was a delayed reaction to what she’d just been through, she knew, but hated that Loki was there to see it. She turned away from him quickly, dropping to a crouch and trying to calm her breathing, willing this attack of panic to fade.

“Jane?”

She got to her feet and spun around as she heard him approach, backing quickly and awkwardly away, back down the hill. Her words were marred by sobs, by the jagged hitch of her emotions, “Stay away!”

And there it was, his sudden realization that he’d pushed her beyond her breaking point. She saw it in his eyes, in the way he sharply inhaled. He’d wanted things to change by showing her that illusion. For all his brilliance, for all his superior powers, he hadn’t been able to predict that rather than cling to him, she’d hate him for it.

They regarded each other in a strained silence, she through eyes that still wept and he through eyes blue and clouded. Finally he turned and began to walk again. Jane, with a shuddering sigh, followed after. She had no choice.

Her only guide in this cruel and thankless universe was a man who used and twisted and hurt for his own gain.

**.x.**

“Understand, Jane—it was a ruse. An illusion. A threat. I meant to humble you, to frighten you into submission, to make you comprehend that I am all you have—all you had. You are … you are aggravatingly mulish in your convictions. I admit I am not accustomed to those that stand against me—not accustomed to mortals doing it, though among Asgardians only Thor and the Allfather ever dared. And Mother, though her declarations were iron wrapped in silk rather than the cold steel of my fath—Odin.”

A pause.

“You … infuriate me so, at times. Even Thor in all his blithe ignorance … he does not rile me as you do. And instead of despising you as I should, instead of loathing you for the impermanence that is intrinsic to your kind, I …”

A longer pause. A slow, deep inhale that radiated frustration. When the words came next they were forced, stilted. “I _feel_. For you. A lust, a craving, a need. At first I banished it, condemned it as a baser instinct. But it persisted despite my resolve to an extreme that never before have I known. And it intrigued me then, the possibilities offered, the sheer novelty of it—your mortality, I surmised, was the draw. And I admired you, Jane, for the fact that even after the enormity of what you have endured you remained intact. There were obvious holes, of course, chinks in your armor that I was aware of immediately after speaking with you that first time. A lesser being would have faltered. A lesser being would have given way. And you endured, too, all that I assaulted you with in my attempts to belittle you, to make you as small as I imagined you to be.”

Silence. When next the words came they were softer, slower, as though each one was considered and weighted. “So willingly you came, joining me in my exile. Even though the choice I gave you was no choice at all, you did not fight me. You did not despair. You thrived. And in you I found … I found a certain kind of tranquility I never thought to know. If I were not who I am, it would have been so easy to slip into the role that that peace demanded. But I am … _this_. And you are as you are, mortal and lovely with your vulnerabilities that morph like quicksilver into something harder, something far stronger than ever I expected …”

A deprecating laugh, nothing more than a short, quiet exhale of air. “I abhor weakness. Particularly when I find it in myself. There is a peculiar, pointed irony to the fact that I speak now to you as I do, as though you are my confidante. I feel as though I should seek absolution from you and I hate it. I answer to no one. I am governed by no one. I exist as I am, free and unmitigated in my ambitions. I have murdered. I have enslaved. I have burned and destroyed and ravaged. Not without reservation—as much as I despise it, I too must fall victim to sentiment periodically. But what I have done, I have done with the clearest of intentions. I have done it all without the guilt that cripples others so, Thor and the Allfather and Frigga and of course your kind, as well.”

“Perhaps it is because I have been so unfettered by guilt that I founder as I do here. Most every decision I have made where you are concerned, Jane, has left me with the unfamiliar and bitter taste of contrition. Again, I must acknowledge the irony in that, you being what you are. I am unaccustomed to feeling this way. I do not like it. But what is between us has come too far, has grown too much, for me to untangle myself now. No, I am caught as surely as the fly in the spider’s web. What’s more, I find that I have no wish any longer to be free of you. These are words that never have I thought to speak to anyone, mortal or not: I anticipate a future where you are near.”

Another long, heavy pause. “… but I suspect, if ever you felt the same, that you no longer do now.”

Jane, sitting with her back against the uneven stone of yet another cavern, stared at Loki mutely. It was a hard silence, cold, a suppression of her rage that was nearly palpable. She had maintained it now for quite some time. She had listened to him speak. She had watched him as he did so, noted the way he couldn’t hold her eyes for long, noted the way the fingers of his left hand played absently with small pebbles on the ground beside him. She’d studied him, sitting on the opposite side of the small cave cross-legged, and wondered how she’d ever been stupid enough to fall for his deception.

Wondered, too, if she could ever learn to stop the way she felt for him.

When she finally spoke long minutes later, her voice had altered. Like her silence it was hard, brittle, every word containing the fury that boiled just beneath the surface. “If I asked you to return me to Earth … ?”

His gaze had been transfixed on the cavern floor. As she spoke his head shot upwards, his eyes fixing unerringly on her own. She couldn’t read his expression as he replied, “No.”

Jane inhaled sharply, preparing a verbal assault. He raised a hand and went on, “I won’t return you to Earth. I was not lying when I told you that Fury intended to keep you imprisoned for the rest of your life. I would not condemn you to that. However I will … I will take you to Asgard. If you wish.”

“And what about your promises?” Jane demanded, her words rapping out with all the brutal emphasis of gunshots. “What about your declarations? I’m yours, Loki, and you never leave behind what’s yours—that’s what you told me, isn’t it?”

Something had changed between them in the moments after Jane had realized just how far he would go to get his way. The balances had tipped. Finally, it had been Loki that had pushed Jane beyond the breaking point. He’d been completely and totally unprepared for the consequences of that fact. In the face of her lividness—so different from what it had been before, so controlled and restrained and cold—he’d had to accept the brunt truth that Jane was only, truly his if _she_ desired it. He could have her by force, of course, but she would never be wholly his. And all of this, Jane knew, was why he was the way he was now—quiet. Unsure. Almost hesitant. Loki, whom almost always won when it came to his ambitions and desires, was suddenly about to lose.

His flinch at those words was nearly imperceptible, but she saw it in the way his eyes darted away from her for the merest dissection of a moment. “Nor will I, unless it’s something you desired.”

“You’re suddenly so considerate,” Jane said in a voice that was very much like a snarl, “in regards to what I want.”

“I’ve wronged you,” he said quietly, holding her eyes with his own, “I can admit to that.”

“You’ve wronged me on so many fucking levels I’ve lost count! But you expect me to be humbled by the fact that you can admit you screwed me over? What about an apology, Loki? Can your great and powerful self stoop to something like that?”

Jane’s voice had risen, and carried by her rage she’d gotten unthinkingly to her feet. With both hands clenched at her sides she stared down at him and it was all she could do not to leap at him, to strike at him, to claw his eyes from his head.

He asked, “Would an apology help?”

Jane sucked in a breath and held it, struggling to control the urge to lash out physically. When she released a sigh, it was a cross between a laugh and a sob. “No,” she said, her voice grown soft and weary, shaking her head. Slowly, she sat back down.

Another extended silence fell between them. Jane found that it was too hard to look at him, too hard to see him for the beautiful, exciting, deadly creature he was. Too hard to pretend that she hadn’t wanted so much for things to work between them. And so she shut her eyes and leaned her head back against the unyielding, uncomfortable wall of the cave, trying to shut out every single thought until merciful nothingness remained.

Of course, it was his voice that intruded on her temporary peace. “If it’s what you wish … I will take you to Asgard.”

“And then you’ll leave.”

“Yes.”

“And what’s—whatever happened between us, it’ll be forgotten?”

“No.”

Jane’s eyes opened. He was watching her, speaking still, “Even if I wished it, I could not forget you. Would not want to.”

“And my other choice?”

“Remain with me.”

“And if I did, would we have another day like today?”

It was he that looked away, unable to meet her eyes in the face of her accusation. “I am not infallible, Jane—”

“You’d certainly like for everyone to think so.”

“And I admit I made an error in judgment.” His voice had hardened and risen to continue over her interruption. “It will not happen again.”

“But something else might. Because you can’t stand it when something doesn’t go your way. You can’t control someone and expect to have their gratitude, Loki. You can’t manipulate everything that happens in the universe.”

“I know that.”

“Maybe you do, but it hasn’t stopped you from trying.”

She was glaring at him again and this time he was glaring back. Their silent clash of wills ended when Loki stood and turned his head away. “You’ve always known what I am, Jane. I made no pretense of it. Despite that, you are still here. You’ve still done what you’ve done.”

“Mistakes have been made on both sides,” she said softly, echoing what he’d said to her just a short time ago.

He closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he was staring at the entrance to the cave. “I will give you however long you need to come to a decision. Choose what you wish to do. I will take you to Asgard and surrender you to Thor’s care. A life there may suit you, despite the fact that you are mortal. And should you wish then to return to Earth, I am certain Thor can appease Fury somehow. And if you—should you choose otherwise …”

She waited for him to say it, watched him struggle to find the words. But in the end he shook his head, glanced her way, and made his way to the exit. “I’ll bring you food and water. I’ll leave them just outside. You’re free to explore. There is nothing out there that can harm you. I will be nearby, even so.”

She remained silent. A curt nod indicated his understanding of her mulish desire to say nothing, and then he stepped around the corner and out of her sight.

**.x.**

He was true to his word in this, at least. He left her alone. In the hours after his departure she remained where she was, resting her head against the uncomfortable stone, uselessly spinning her thoughts around this very large, very grim dilemma she was faced with. Loki was no saint. Loki was, by the very definition, a villain. And it was Loki who—because Fate’s humor was cold and remorseless, because irony had great designs on her life—held, if not her heart, then at least a large part of her soul, such as it was, rent and tattered and worn.

She was not hungry, though Loki had left her food as he said he would. Eventually the raging turmoil of her thoughts gave way to exhaustion, and she curled up on her side on the floor of the cave and slept deeply, dreamlessly. When she awoke the cave was lit with the glow of daylight from the entrance, informing her that she’d slept the entire night through. She got to her feet slowly, feeling stiff and sore, and drifted to the cave’s entrance. Loki was not there, as she’d half hoped and feared he would be. Instead there was only a small pile of edible things leaves and berries, mostly—and a bizarrely shaped earthenware container that held water. After standing motionless and staring at Loki’s offering for long moments, Jane knelt, gathered them up, and took them back into the cave. She ate some of what she’d been given and drank a bit of the water before opting to store the rest. After all, there was no way of knowing if Loki would really keep providing the way he’d said he would …

She didn’t want to believe he would. She wanted to know with certainty that he’d leave her here, that he’d abandon her the way he’d made her think he had, that he’d cast her off to the merciless whims of the universe. It pained her to know that he would do none of those things. He’d remain here, provide for her, guard her until she finally made up her mind. He would _care_ for her. And that was what made this so incredibly difficult—she couldn’t hate Loki the way she should because of the fact that she _had_ changed him, in ways both subtle and not. He’d been altered due to what he felt for her. It gnawed at her, hurt her, that any changes he'd undergone were not enough to reconcile their differences and the chasm between her mortality and his immortality.

That night passed like the one before it. She spent the evening lost in thoughts of anger and sadness, sleeping only when weariness could no longer be held at bay. The next day she ventured out of the cave for a short while, daring to take a walk through the forest. She saw no sign of Loki, though when she returned there was fresh food at the entrance to the cave. And so the days slipped into a cycle of sameness. Every morning she rose and spent the daylight hours immersed in thoughts of sorrow and frustration, and every night she slept, sometimes easily, sometimes not.

It was the sixth day that Jane heard the sound of footsteps encroaching in the cave. She had just finished bathing, using the bulk of the water she’d saved that Loki had brought to get clean. She’d just finished donning her jeans when she heard the footfalls. She paused in the act of braiding her damp hair, her body going tense as she wondered why Loki was showing himself now and what he would have to say.

But it was not Loki that shaped himself out of the shadows of the cave. It was Thor.

 

**.x.**


	13. Hard Answers

**.13.**

"Jane," Thor breathed, coming to a halt and staring at her, wide-eyed. Even in the dim interior of the cave his armor shone, glinting from the smallest rays of light that managed to make their intrusion into the cavern's depths. In one hand he held Mjollnir, the weapon as much a part of him as any of his limbs. He looked tired, Jane noted with a certain kind of shocked detachment. Tired and travel-stained, as though he'd been a long time away from Asgard.

"I did not think … I was certain I would not see you again," he said after a long moment.

Jane found that she still could not reply. Thor went on, "You have escaped him then? Word came to me that the two of you had been located on Nidavellir, but by the time I arrived there was no trace. I have been looking—have had my people looking—ever since he took you from Earth …"

He trailed off awkwardly. It was obvious that whatever reunion he'd had in mind, this was not it. Jane was struggling to find something— _anything—_ to say. Thor ventured, "Has he hurt you, Jane?"

"No …" her voice was hoarse; this was the first time she'd spoken since Loki had left her alone in the cave some several days ago. "No. I'm not hurt."  _Not in any way you can see, at least._

Thor took several steps forward, treading cautiously as though Jane might bolt. She  _was_  feeling cornered, horribly unprepared for this encounter. "I am so very sorry you were caught up in this, Jane," he said. "I stripped Loki of his powers and sent him to Earth to render him less of a threat—"

"Still a threat to me, though," Jane interrupted coldly.

Thor looked utterly remorseful, "I know, Jane, and I am sorry. I had no other options, not after what he had done. It was the only choice open to me."

"You could have  _asked_ me!" Her voice was suddenly strident, echoing throughout the cave. "You could've come to me and asked me if I could do it. You could've  _warned_ me! But I heard nothing from you, had heard nothing from you, not since …"

And there it was, hanging in the air between them, that horrible unspoken thing that had completely destroyed Jane's life and dictated her chaotic, painful, arduous rebirth. She stared at Thor, caught completely in the grips of her anger, her righteousness, her anguish that she'd been harboring for far too long.

"You could have come for me," she said softly. "You knew what was happening to me. You had to know."

Thor's expression contorted, lines of grief and helplessness appearing between his brows and beneath his eyes, making him look suddenly haggard. "Jane, you do not understand. The one that took you, the one that hurt you so—I am forbidden from attacking him. To do so would be to ignite a war between our two worlds and that I could not allow. It is a part of the truce that was signed eons ago, a price for the peace—"

"So I became expendable."

There was a very grim, very strained silence. And then: "Please, Jane, I implore you to try to understand. The safety of all Asgard hung in the balance. For millennia the truce had been unbroken, for good reason—the last time we warred with him, it was very nearly our doom."

"I suppose," Jane said, her throat tight, wrenching the words from within with a painful, dogged determination, "that I should've known, back then, that loving you would put me in danger."

Another silence. Thor, she saw, could not hold her gaze any longer.

"Do you know," she whispered, "what Surtr did to me?"

And there it was,  _that_ name, uttered into the stillness of the cave. Thor shut his eyes, twisting his head to the side—wincing, she realized, because she'd dared said  _that_ name aloud. An ugly feeling began welling up inside of her, twisting her stomach, curling her fingers into fists.

"You don't want to hear his name," she said, spitting her words. Ever since that day her life had been uprooted, remade, twisted into a parody of the normal life she'd once had. The sick feeling within her grew, spreading, until her limbs were tingling yet numb, until it felt like her lungs were constricted, clamped in the iron vice of her anger. "You don't want to hear his  _name_ , but he hurt me because of you. I bled for you and Asgard, because you knew,  _you knew and you didn_ _'t come!_ "

"Jane—"

"You loved me! That's what you told me! Did you lie to me?"

"No, I meant—"

"You're a god. You could've done  _something_ —"

" _I could not!"_ His shout overrode hers, booming around the confines of the cave with enough force to make her wince. Immediately he strode forward, dropping Mjollnir so that he could hold his hands out before him, his expression an amalgam of anguish, regret, and guilt. "Jane,  _please —_  I could not come for you. I wanted to, I cannot explain to you how much I wished I could. But I had to protect my people —it is my destiny, it is my birthright, it is  _who I am._ I could not plunge them into another horrific war. It was a terrible choice I had to make. It was the worst choice I have ever had to make. And I have hated myself every day since then for making it."

Jane refused to meet his pleading gaze, her eyes instead focused on a point just over his shoulder. He took another step forward, almost timid in his movement, and reached for her. His hands on her shoulders, he continued in a softer voice, "I knew they—the Avengers—would do what they could to protect you."

Abruptly, her eyes slid sideways to meet his own. " _Try_ to protect me," she said.

Thor swallowed hard. His own eyes, she saw, held the telltale shine of tears. "I am so sorry, Jane. I am sorry you had to suffer so much because of me, because of Asgard. I know I have no right to ask, but please, you must believe me. I did not want this. You are — you know what you are to me. You know of my love —"

"But it wasn't enough. It was never going to be." And as she said the words, she was struck by the recollection of what Loki had said to her once, the same night he'd kissed her for the second time,  _"… myopic in his loyalty to his father, to Asgard. Blind as always to the difference between duty and priority."_

She understood now, finally, what he'd meant. She reached up with her hands and wrapped her fingers around his wrists, gently removing his hands from her shoulders. She couldn't help but look at his face to see his cheeks lined with tears, to see the sad, brutal truth haunting his eyes.

"And after?" Jane's voice was low as she let go of his wrists. His arms fell to his sides. "After, when it was over, when I needed you more than ever?"

"I —" Thor closed his eyes, bowed his head. He swallowed hard again, as though trying to force down the enormity of his emotions. Jane watched, motionless and silent as tears continued to dampen his cheeks, his beard, drip from his chin.

"I could not face you," he said raggedly, head still bowed. "I could not face you. I knew what he — what Surtr had done to you. Heimdall had shown me everything. I let it happen, I had to let it happen, and I could not overcome my shame."

Again, Jane found herself recalling words Loki had spoken to her one night, so long ago. Despite his avarice, despite his jealousy and resentment, the trickster brother had told her the truth. And now she stood before the brother she had once loved, watching as he wept silently because of all she'd had to endure. Despite her resolve, her anger, her confusion, she felt her heart ache at the strength of Thor's remorse. She understood now why he had done what he'd done. Understood that her life — a  _mortal_ _'s_  life — had been weighed against the fate of an entire race of people. Understood that whatever love she and Thor had shared had hadn't been enough — would never have been enough — for Thor to condemn his people to war unending.

She understood. But that didn't make it right. It didn't erase the suffering, the chaos, the ugly metamorphosis she'd had to undergo. Thor hadn't forseen this, years ago when he'd fallen for her. And she couldn't have predicted it, though she should have had some idea that to love a hero would mean that she would always court the villain. It hadn't been Thor's design. It had been the malicious, fickle machinations of fate and circumstance on a level she couldn't even begin to understand.

She laid a hand on Thor's shoulder. He lifted his head finally, eyes meeting hers.

"I don't hate you," she told him, surprising herself. And as his eyes widened just a little, she saw she'd surprised him too.

"You should," he said.

Her smile was both sweet and sad. "I know."

She let her hand fall away. They stood before each other for long, quiet moments. He stirred, lifting a hand to wipe at the moisture on his face. "Jane … is there any hope for a future? Between you and I? Or am I foolish to dare even dream it?"

"… you know there isn't, Thor."

He closed his eyes and nodded once. "Aye. But I cannot help but … it does not matter anymore, does it?"

She shook her head. "No."

He cleared his throat and took a step backward, reaching down to pick up his hammer. "I will dwell on it no longer, then. I will speak instead of returning you to Earth. I have spoken to Fury and explained the circumstances. He no longer seeks your imprisonment. You can return to live however you please. We can leave as soon as you are ready."

And Jane said, "No."

His eyes shot to hers. "No?"

"I don't want to return."

" … Jane? I thought, when Loki abducted you —"

"If you hadn't appeared," Jane said, mentally steeling herself for what was about to transpire, "I would've made the choice to go with him."

Thor's brows furrowed, his expression one of confounded astonishment. "What are you saying? You cannot possibly —"

She remained silent, her eyes on his unwavering. He stared at her uncomprehending until realization widened his eyes, slackened his jaw. "Jane, no.  _No!_ "

"You sent him to me," she said, striving for an even tone. The waver in her words betrayed her. "You sent him to me, for me to protect, to hide from the world. He lived with me for months. He was my only companion. You made it so."

"You cannot possibly mean to tell me," he said in a strangled voice, "that you have come to have feelings for my brother, that serpent, that liar, that —"

"Murderer," Jane calmly interjected. "Manipulator. Torturer. Villain. I know what he is, better than most. Perhaps, by now, even better than you."

"You love him."

"Maybe, on some level." The horrified disbelief in Thor's gaze made it impossible for her to continue looking at him. "I'm not the person you once knew. I've changed—I was forced to change."

"But not like this. Gods, not like this!"

"What did you expect?" Her voice had risen just as his had, her words and the torment in them amplified by the recesses of the cave. "That I would be the same as I was before? The same naive, stupid woman who stumbled blindly into a romance with you, a man — a _god_ — from another world? That after Surtr had taken his pound of flesh that I'd be ready and willing to return to your loving embrace, whenever you could be bothered to come and see me again?"

"But  _Loki?_ "

"Are you really judging me, Thor?" The question was quiet, the words pointed as a blade and as he blanched, she knew she'd managed to wound.

"Do you know," he asked her then, "why I sent him to you?"

"Some of it. He'd imprisoned your father somewhere and took his place. Ruled Asgard in his stead."

"He strove to bring Asgard to war with anyone he possibly could. He broke truces, destroyed trade agreements, provoked formerly peaceful allies to a vengeful fury. And all because he could not overcome his need to do what his kind has done since their creation: conquer, regardless of the bloody cost. He meant to lead Asgard into war after war, and I was too late in realizing his deceit to prevent conflict. Once I discovered the truth I imprisoned him, but the impending war was of such a great magnitude that I lacked the resources to leave him under perpetual guard. I needed to exile him, remove him from Asgard so he could not engage in further treachery. In truth I would have gladly killed him, Jane, but for the fact that he still holds my father prisoner somewhere. The only other choice I had was to exile him as my father had once exiled me, render him mortal and send him to Earth so that he could no longer interfere in any way."

"So please, Jane," he continued in a voice gone deathly quiet, "tell me why,  _why_ , you would ever be able to say you care for someone who could so easily manipulate and cast aside the fate of an entire world?

Jane answered the only way she could. "I don't know." Before he could say anything else, she asked, "Why did you return his powers to him?"

She was astonished by how quickly his face twisted, how clearly the bitterness and hatred appeared in harsh lines across his face. "Because Asgard  _needed_  him. The threat he had created, the war he had ignited — it was nearly too much. As contemptible as Loki is, he has power and resources greater than most any other I know. I released him because I knew he would return. I knew he would fight for Asgard, even if his reasons for doing so were as twisted and false as his soul."

"Why didn't you recapture him, afterward? Exile him again?"

"I made every attempt to. He is still a war criminal. He still holds the Allfather. The battles had taken their toll, not only on me, but all of Asgard. And Loki … as always, he had plans layered upon plans. He took advantage of the chaos after our victory and slipped away, beyond my reach. I feared he was returning to your world, to attempt to settle his score with me through you. Heimdall located you at S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters. The rest you already know."

And there it was, the last piece of this long, difficult puzzle that she'd been attempting to assemble since Loki had arrived in her backyard all those months ago. Jane said nothing, silently assimilating all he'd told her. She turned and walked toward the back of the cave, aware of Thor ghosting at her heels.

At her back, he made a sound of utter frustration. "You cannot mean to tell me you have come to trust him, Jane. You cannot believe he would not hurt you. Jane, he is vile, a snake, a traitor — you know this!"

"Yes, brother," Loki's voice slipped, knife-edged, into the conversation. "She does."

Thor whipped around, Mjollnir raised. Jane remained where she was, eyes fastened on Loki where he stood, acutely conscious of the fact that her heart had begun to race the instant she'd become aware of his presence.

"Loki," Thor said in a voice that was almost guttural, weighted as it was with emotion.

"Thor," said the other, lips curved in his familiar mocking smile. "I was beginning to think we had slipped your search parties entirely."

"Cease this. Cease." Thor let the arm holding Mjollnir fall. Jane, standing behind him, could not see his face but she could hear the sudden weariness in his tone, see the way his shoulders sagged as though the burden of a thousand kingdoms had just been piled upon his shoulders. She ached suddenly to go to him, to help ease the strains he carried and she hated it—where had he been, when she'd crumbled beneath the weight of her own disastrous life?

"Whatever could you possibly mean?" Loki was still standing near the mouth of the cave. His tone of voice was calm, conversational, but Jane heard the undercurrent of venom and realized that in all likelihood, Loki had overheard the entire conversation between herself and Thor.

"Your games," Thor said tiredly. He glanced back at Jane and then to his brother. "Cease your cursed games for once. Let this be over. Release Odin. Release Jane."

"Jane," Loki said, eyes flickering over Thor's shoulder to where she stood, then back again. "You misunderstand, brother. She is free to go wherever she chooses."

It was a partial truth. He  _had_  offered to take her wherever she wished to go.

Thor considered Loki for a long moment before half-turning. "Jane?"

"… he said he would take me anywhere I wanted," she told him.

"And you remained here. With him."

"No." She shook her head, hearing the disbelief that had crept back into his voice. "He left, to give me time to decide."

"Decide?"

"Where I would go next."

"You only just told me you wished to remain!"

"Because I don't know what I want!" Her shout startled them both, startled her. She was tired of arguments and discussions, tired of having every word uttered from her or to her somehow being able to emotionally wound. "I wanted time, time to think, time to figure things out!"

"Jane, let me return you to Earth. You can go home."

Jane made a helpless, frustrated sound at Thor's words.  _Home._ Home had been the house in the Rockies, home had been her life there before Loki's arrival. But now, after all that had happened, was returning there to live and pretend that none of this had ever happened even possible?

Her hesitation was apparent, and Loki reacted exactly as she expected him to. "It is a gallant offer he makes, Jane. Return with him to your humble little home and try your best to resume living a humble little life. Try your best to forget what has transpired, what we have  _shared_ _…_ "

His pause was perfectly calculated, his eyes as he spoke fixed firmly upon Thor. "But we both know that won't be possible. Because you will always, until the end of your days, remember me."

"Jane?" Thor had turned his head toward her, that one word carrying a forlorn hope that what Loki was saying consisted only of lies.

"It never went that far," she told him. "We aren't lovers."

He stared at her, clearly wanting to believe desperately what she had just said. And then Loki laughed, the familiar, biting laughter that had been directed at Jane so often in the past.

"Take her, Thor. Take her and return her to Earth or keep her to yourself. It no longer concerns me.  _She_ no longer concerns me. It was folly that led me here and folly to presume—"

There was a catch in his voice, and he stopped speaking suddenly, shaking his head violently as though he hadn't meant for those words to escape. He was breathing fast, eyes darting from Jane to Thor, struggling to keep his emotions from showing on his face. But it was there, in tightness of his jaw and the thin, clamped line of his lips. It was blatantly, perfectly evident that Loki was on the verge of losing control.

Thor was staring at his brother in stunned disbelief. He stirred as Jane began to move, reaching for her as she walked past him. She skirted his reach, placing one determined step in front of the other until she stood directly in front of Loki.

"Was it folly?" Her voice was soft, controlled. Once upon a time, in the face of his rage and distress, she would have been terrified of him. Things had changed so much, so thoroughly since then, and she knew that Loki's fits of emotion would never again affect her the way they once had. "We were happy, for a little while. Was that folly?"

"It was folly to presume that a  _mortal_ could—"

"Could what, Loki?"

But he didn't reply. It was as if he was cornered, trapped, but was unable to tear his eyes from her face. She stepped closer and it seemed as though he would give way before her. But she watched as breathed deep, as he squared his shoulders, and was unsurprised to see his mouth twist into a parody of a smile. He opened his mouth to speak, to spit something vitriolic at her, at Thor. But Jane was ready.

"You're a fool," she told him and watched as his eyes narrowed into slits. "You would assume in a heartbeat that everything I said to you, everything I did was only a lie because it's just easier for you. Until that day, until you put me through that illusion, it was good. You know it. And now you'd cast me aside, hurl insults at me, because you think there's no going back."

Eyes still narrowed, hands curled into fists at his side, he asked, "And is there?"

"There could be."

He studied her face for long seconds. She waited patiently as he did so. She felt nothing but a quiet, disjointed sense of calm and though it surprised her, she welcomed it. Abruptly Loki moved, stepping past Jane and walking toward Thor. She swiveled around to track his progress, her calm abandoning her somewhat at the sight of the two brothers, the two adversaries, standing within only a couple feet of each other.

"I will release Odin," Loki said.

Thor stared at him as though he'd gone insane. "It is not that simple with you, Loki. It never is. What do you demand in exchange?"

"Do not search for us. Do not attempt to apprehend us. Forget about us."

"You are mad! Jane, come with me away from here, away from  _him!_ "

"I am staying, Thor," she replied softly. "It's what I want."

Several expressions shifted across his bearded face in quick succession: anguish, rage, fear, frustration. Utterly distraught, he turned his attention back to Loki. "It cannot be that way. You know this. Father will want you found, executed for what you have done! You will be hunted for the rest of your days and Jane along with you!"

"You are his favorite son — his  _only_ son. You must convince him otherwise."

"It is impossible!"

Loki said nothing. The sound Thor made then was one of mingled defeat and disgust. "I will do what I can. That is all I can promise. But you know him, Loki. You know how this latest treachery of yours will affect him. You will never be safe and Jane —"

"—is no longer your concern, brother."

Loki said it gently, purposefully. And Thor, whose eyes had been fixed beseechingly on Jane, looked suddenly back to his brother. He'd heard, Jane knew, the same thing in Loki's voice that she had and it had astonished him.

Finally Thor asked, "How can I trust you to release him from wherever he's being imprisoned?"

Loki made no reply. Instead, he faded from view, shifting from this realm to another entirely, leaving Jane and Thor alone in the cave once more.

Thor said, his voice shaking, " _Please_ , Jane."

She shook her head. "No."

He opened his mouth again to speak but stopped as suddenly Loki was there again, a corporeal figure once more. "It is done," he said.

"Where is he now?"

"Safe once again in Asgard."

"If he is not—"

"You will hunt me down. I know. Trust me in this, Thor, if ever you have trusted me before. Odin is free."

Thor stared hard at him before running a hand over his face, the gesture one of grim resignation. "Very well," he said, and then again, "Very well."

He brushed roughly past Loki, making his way to Jane. The look he gave her held so many things, regret and sorrow and guilt. He turned his head, spoke over his shoulder to his brother, "If you are capable of any decent thing, Loki, let it be that you keep her safe."

And Loki being Loki, replied with, "I will protect her better than you ever have."

Thor closed his eyes. Opened them again. He lifted his free hand and touched it to Jane's face, cupping her cheek. She regarded him steadily, though inwardly a sudden knot of loss and remorse knotted her stomach. He let fall his hand, then, and moved past her to the entrance of the cave.

And then he was gone.

**.x.**

_What did I just do?_

Jane stared after Thor and found that her hard-earned calm was threatening to abandon her completely. Thor had been her link to the admittedly questionable safety of her old life, but it had been a link. And now she was here, alone—by her  _own_  choice—with Loki, who was unpredictability and danger personified.

She desperately hoped that she'd read the situation correctly. As if sensing her unease, Loki began to move, approaching her slowly as though concerned she might flee. It was a thought she was considering.

"I confess to be clueless as to what should happen next," he said.

Jane, who had been planning for this moment, found herself facing the exact same dilemma.

"I suspect," Loki said, "that Vanaheim no longer appeals to you as it once did. The worlds are yours to choose from, Jane. Where do we go next?"

"We don't," she said, and watched confusion mar the space between his brows.

"We remain here, then. Hiding from the Allfather's wrath will require considerable—"

"No. I stay here. Alone."

Comprehension dawned on Loki, swift and brutal. In a heartbeat his expression had morphed from one of guarded curiosity to one of bitter rage. "You lied."

In the face of his anger, Jane felt only a peculiar sense of relief.  _This_ was familiar ground. "I didn't lie."

His laugh was a short, bitter expulsion of air. "You led me to believe you wished to be with me. You have grown to be a most convincing liar, Jane."

"Think about what you did to me days ago. You convinced me that I was dying just to make me submit to you in every decision. Manipulating me that way was easy for you. It didn't bother you to screw with my head that way. It bothered me. Terrified me. Hurt me. Infuriated me. And I will never be able to forget that."

"So why the charade?" Loki's demand was little more than a hiss. "For Thor's benefit?"

Jane shook her head. "It wasn't a charade. I meant what I said to you. I am drawn to you and I always will be. I'll always want you. I crave your touch. And I think …" here she paused, taking a deep breath, concentrating on keeping her own voice even. "I think that in some way, somehow, that maybe what I feel for you is more than simple lust. If someone like me could ever love someone like you …"

Those words hung in the air between them, weighted and combustible with meaning. His expression had become shuttered and she could read nothing now in his eyes, in the way he held himself. She went on, "But I won't give into it. I won't embrace it. Not until I'm ready. And not until  _you're_ ready. Because we're not, either of us. You know it as well as I do."

"And so you'll stay here on a foreign planet alone, without me. How will you survive without my guidance and my protection?"

"I don't know. What I do know is that there's nowhere else for me currently. And I'm — I am resilient. I can do this. I will do this."

"The men that I presented to you in the illusion — Jane, they are real. They inhabit the forests of this world. And they are just as hostile as I led you to believe. If they find you —"

"What could they possibly do to me that I haven't already gone through?"

They both knew the answer to that. She said, "This is what I want. To live here, alone. To learn to truly  _be_ alone. I need it, need the time to better understand … everything . To learn to appreciate the way things are and to accept them. And once I've done that, it can be our time."

"Our time," he echoed. His tight, guarded expression had eased somewhat. "I am a very impatient man, Jane."

She smiled faintly. "I think I know that better than anyone."

She nodded. "I know."

"I can aid you. I can make survival here easier. I know, you do not want my direct interference. But there are other ways, if you will allow."

"Yes," she said to him. "Please."

They regarded each other in silence, then, the seconds ticking past. Finally he spoke, his voice suddenly curt. "I dislike change. Particularly when  _I_ am the one undergoing it. I will wait for you, Jane, and I will leave you here alone, but I cannot say that I will wait indefinitely. It is not how I am."

He moved, striding toward the entrance of the cage. She stepped into his path, waylaying him with a hand on his arm. The other hand she lifted, laid gently against his cheek. He made no move to stop her, but did not lean into her touch either.

"It's only time," she told him softly.

He said nothing. But she saw it in his gaze, the lust and the attraction, the fears and the insecurities. He reached up and pulled her hand away, twining his fingers with hers and squeezing for only a brief moment before he stepped away from her, turned, and left the cave, following the exact footsteps of his brother.

Into the silence that was now only hers, she mouthed the words she couldn't say aloud.

**.x.**  


_**Sol's Notes:** _ _I'm back from an unforgivably huge absence. I know I said it before, but the end really is near!_


	14. One Final Threshold

**.14.**

With Loki’s departure, Jane had experienced an acute attack of sanity. One thought clamored louder than the many, many others currently crowding her mind: w _hat THE FUCK am I doing?_

She didn’t know. She couldn’t explain it. What she did know was that the prospect of living any other life filled her with so much panic and uncertainty that she was certain she would be smothered beneath the enormity of it all. Normality no longer had a place in her life. Every bridge to her previous lifestyle had been burned. The only way to go was forward, but she had no idea how to do that other than to do a hard reset, to alienate herself completely and start building up from there.

And she was so, so scared.

It no longer felt like she was _Jane._ She’d been more than one Jane in her life. There was the Jane who had existed in relative ignorance in regards to the true workings of the universe prior to meeting Thor. There was the Jane who had experienced the heady, flaring passion of loving him. There was the Jane who, after being tortured brutally and mercilessly by Surtr, had had to go into hiding and chiseled away at the weaker parts of herself in an effort to become harder, indestructible. There was the Jane who had done her best to accomplish the insurmountable task of protecting Loki from the world while at the same time protecting herself from him. She’d failed at the last part, but not because she hadn’t been strong enough. She’d failed because the woman she’d become after everything she’d endured had been full of holes.

There was a hole where her sense of morality had been. She still knew the fundamentals of right and wrong, but her world view now had more shades of grey than it had previously. She knew why, of course; she’d experienced firsthand catastrophic reversals of right and wrong. What had happened to her at the hands of Surtr had been wrong, so very wrong. What would have been right, what _should_ have been right, was Thor rescuing her from that awful situation.  Wrong was when Thor sent his criminal brother to her for safeguarding. Right would have seen Thor doing everything he could to keep any kind of evil — including Loki — from ever doing Jane harm again.

There were holes in her concept of love too, gaping ones that pretty much ensured that anything she’d ever believed about it had been erased from existence. She’d never thought of herself as being particularly naive, even before she’d met Thor. She understood now that everyone was naive until they weren’t. She’d loved Thor and at first it had been good, so very good. But like so many others, she’d harbored certain ideals about love: it would always be good, it mended hurts, it could transcend almost anything. By that logic, loving Thor should have saved her from Surtr, should have kept her safe from harm, should have _at the very least_ kept her life free of Loki.

Love had done none of that.

Love as she’d previously understood it was a liability. It left you open to disappointment. It made you vulnerable — in Jane’s case, catastrophically so. It seemed logical to assume that any mortal man Jane may love after Thor could be the balm to her soul that so many assumed love to be, but she knew better. Parts of Jane had become irreversibly twisted in the aftermath of what she’d endured. She understood better now that only a very lucky few could love without suffering, understood too that it was a fleeting, fickle emotion. Perhaps it was this new understanding that had propelled her to where she was now, on the precipice of saying yes to Loki and plummeting to whatever depths he would take her to. Perhaps it was why she wanted him. Her rebirth from old Jane to new Jane hadn’t been a pure one. The woman that had risen from the ashes was a tremendously flawed one, one whose eyes saw the true grittiness of the world. She’d lost the inherently human ability to live life according the delusions she’d forced upon herself. And in doing so, in seeing the universe for its true capricious nature, she’d found herself drawing closer and closer to Loki to share in his similar world view.

All of this was why she felt as though she was _not,_ as though she was still present in her body but watching herself from a distance. Every thought, every word she’d spoken to both Thor and Loki in the cave had seemed real yet surreal. She was experiencing a separation, a final divide between whatever ragged remnants of her old self still existed and the self that was just coming into its own. Jane was not Jane. Jane was Jane. The sensation of not belonging while belonging was an insidious one, one that was threatening a complete and total invasion of her mind. And as confused and frightened as she was, she knew that she had to reconcile this turmoil before she could do anything else. The consequences if she did not, she knew, could sunder her completely.

Despite all this, despite her absolute conviction that to survive with sanity intact she needed isolation, she couldn’t hold back the panic. She was alone on Vanaheim. Both men who could have returned her to Earth she’d sent away. She knew that she wasn’t truly alone; Loki may not be present, but he was watching over her. It wasn’t her survival that terrified her so completely. It was the fact that she would now have to deal with the schism within herself that she’d neglected for far too long.

The minutes ticked past after Loki had left, becoming hours. Jane had not moved but to sit on the cavern floor. She was rendered immobile by indecision, by apprehension. _Tomorrow,_ she told herself at one point. _I can deal with it all tomorrow._

Somehow, she slept.

**.x**

Her first thought of the morning was, _I_ _’ll ask him to send me home._

Her decision the day before had been ludicrous. Laughable. She’d lived alone before, yes, but living alone in a world with modern luxuries like power and shelter and easily obtainable food was very, very different from surviving on an alien world she knew nothing about. Even though the thought of returning to Earth made her feel like she was suffocating, she couldn’t see any other way.

She had no idea how to contact Loki, though she suspected it would be as simple as just saying his name. She got to her feet, stretching stiffly, and took a moment to drink a little water before she started to move. Upon exiting the cave she winced and closed her eyes; the morning sun was painfully bright. Shielding her eyes with one hand, she glanced around and wondered if it mattered where she stood when trying to summon Loki.

She paused when her eyes fell upon the spot where Loki had previously left her food and water. There was a literal pile of objects there now. Curious, Jane approached, crouching to get a better look. There was a large, lengthy bundle wrapped in leather, which Jane picked up, surprised at the weight. Undoing the ties, she unrolled the leather to find that it contained weapons. There was a knife and two daggers, as well as a small handheld weapon that looked like no gun Jane had either seen, on Earth or Asgard. The heaviest one was also the longest; it was clearly a rifle, but again of a design Jane was not familiar with. Finishing the parcel was a small, rectangular item that she instantly recognized: it was a cigarette lighter. Smiling a little, she examined all the items thoroughly once more before wrapping the bundle back up and placing it off to the side.

She turned her attention next to a pile of clothing, unfolding each piece. This, she knew, was Asgardian in design. It wasn’t purely for leisure, but it wasn’t battle armor either. Instead it was what she imagined Asgardian hunters would wear, a mix of supple leather and rough cloth. There were boots to accompany the clothes, unmarked and clean. And in the event of colder weather, she’d been provided with both a fur-lined cloak and vest. Even though it was apparent that all of this equipment was brand new, Jane knew with a certainty that it would fit her perfectly. She wondered for a moment where Loki had gotten it all from, but shook her head. She was grateful. Nothing else mattered.

The last offering was the most important, though she didn’t realize it right away. Arranged in a painstakingly organized way on the flat surface of a rock was a selection of different vegetation. There were plant leaves, sprigs of bushes laden with berries, and large rooted plants among many more. Jane’s confused frown abruptly eased as comprehension struck; it was a guide to what was safe for her to eat.

She rocked back on her heels, considering everything Loki had left for her. Could she fire a gun? No, not well. But she could learn, and from the looks of the two firearms, they were energy based. She wasn’t certain, but she didn’t think she’d have to rely on ammo and if she did, she knew Loki would provide more. He’d given her three sets of clothing, and if she was diligent about maintaining them, they’d last her a long time. And the plants … she’d still have to be careful, of course, but she could memorize their appearance and work from there. Even if she did eat something she shouldn’t, Loki would be watching.

Wouldn’t he?

Jane blew out a breath, considering. The playing field before had consisted of odds stacked firmly against her. Loki had done her a huge favor by leveling that field. She could try her plan of living here alone with all these supplies. If she failed, she failed. But if she could manage it …

She liked the idea. And suddenly she felt optimistic, for the first time in a very long time. “Thank you, Loki,” she murmured before getting to her feet.

It was then that she saw his final gift. She stepped over the rock where the plants lay to get a better look. On the stony ground Loki had etched out a map. It looked as though the lines had been burned with laser precision into the rock. It was a permanent feature now. He’d outlined the areas nearby, pinpointing sources of fresh water and areas where she could hunt. _Deer — rabbit — boar,_  he’d written in his thin, elegant scrawl, outlining to her what the animals she could hunt would look like. And within of the bodies of water he’d precisely outlined: _fish._ Jane studied the map intently, noting that he’d also marked where the plants he’d picked for her grew. However, there was another area he’d written, to the northeast of her cave, and the one word he’d written there chilled her: _Danger._ That, she knew, was where the hostile natives, the ones he’d shown her in the illusion, would dwell.

The map, so intricate and accurate and informative, made up her mind for her. She’d be here living her alone, but she wouldn’t be surviving on merit of her own skills. Loki had given her a huge advantage in that area. She was grateful and relieved. Knowing she wouldn’t have to thrust herself back into a world she no longer wanted made her feel calmer than she had in a long time.

It wasn’t only that, though. It was also the fact that Loki had bothered to do any of this at all. A few months ago, he would have left her here with nothing, consigning her to death. He wouldn’t have believed she had the resolve to actually attempt something like this. This was a sign that he’d changed. She wasn’t stupid enough to think that Loki would ever change so much that he wouldn’t be difficult — he was too willful, to prideful to allow that to happen. But in providing her with the tools she needed to live a life alone on Vanaheim, he’d let her know that his interest in her wasn’t fleeting. Or at least, was still strong at present.

And so, after studying the map a little longer, Jane began to gather up all her new belongings, making two trips to deposit them in the cave that was now her home.

**.x.**

It was, in the end, more difficult than she’d ever believed it would be to live alone on Vanaheim. Even with the gear and instructions Loki had given her, she found herself tempted to contact Loki a million times over.

She’d started that first day by attempting to learn how to shoot. She’d chosen the rifle because she was hesitant about getting too close to something she was trying to kill. Guns were to her unfamiliar territory and without an instructor, she was pretty much clueless. After nearly an hour of excruciating frustration, she’d managed to locate what functioned as the safety on the rifle — a shallow, almost impossible to see indentation that pulsed once beneath her finger when she pressed it. After that, she’d taken the rifle, propped it on a rock, and aimed at the larger rocks that littered the slope leading to the cave mouth. She aimed, holding her breath and squinting through the scope imprinted with strange, alien symbols. She pulled the trigger.

And missed. And missed. And missed again.

It took the better part of another hour before she was even able to clip one of the rocks. _It just takes time,_ she told herself, and resolutely went back to practicing.

By the end of the day she’d gotten slightly better, having learned the feel of the rifle and the tension of the trigger. She was still discouraged and on top of that, hungry. She still had some leftover food that Loki had gathered for her before Thor had arrived and finished it off. The next day, she knew, it was about to get truly difficult.

And it did. Every day after that was a struggle. She scheduled her time, assigning different tasks to different parts of the day. Mornings she hunted, or tried to. If not for the fact that Loki had, one night, delivered a supply of fish still alive in a clay container full of water, she would have succumbed to the demands of her hunger and admitted defeat. It took eleven days before Jane was finally able to kill something, and when she did, it was a small, pig-like creature. She was instantly exuberant — she’d done it! That exuberance, however, faded when she realized she’d have to haul the dead animal all the way back to her cave, a twenty minute walk away.

Carrying it was a study in frustration. She tried slinging it over her shoulder, but it kept sliding either forward or back. She dragged it briefly before realizing that method would tire her out faster than anything else. Eventually she settled on cradling it in her arms, which led to her discovery that the small woodland creature she’d just slaughtered smelled bad, dripped blood all over her clothes, and had fur that was as about as gentle on her skin as a wire brush.

Once at the cave, she faced another massive dilemma. She had no clue how to field dress an animal. She was reluctant to waste any food, but having no knowledge of how to butcher it meant that she inevitably would. It was also going to be messy and disgusting work, but she’d mentally prepared for that part. And so she set to it, using the knives Loki had provided, attempting to skin the animal. Instead, she mangled it but did manage to carve off hunks of meat that had her mouth watering when she thought of them cooked.

She didn’t know how to cure or preserve meat, which meant that what she couldn’t eat right away would go to waste. She resolved to pursue smaller game from that point forward. As for the pig, well — without any kind of seasoning it was bland when cooked, but it was meat. Combined with the root vegetables and fruit she’d gathered, it gave her a meal that she’d started to think she wasn’t capable of.

That day became the turning point. She stopped questioning whether she could and focused on making it happen.

**.x.**

She marked days with lines etched on the cave wall.

The sixty-third day was the first day she didn’t wake up thinking about her house on Earth.

The eighty-first day was the day she realized she’d transitioned from struggling to survive to enjoying the patterns of her new life.

The one hundred and sixteenth day she reflected on Surtr and what he’d done and found that while the terror of those memories was still present, it had faded substantially to the point where it didn’t lurk always in the forefront of her mind.

The one hundred and thirty fourth day, she found that whatever resentment she’d harbored toward Thor had faded.

And on the one hundred and seventy second day, when she realized that she felt human again, functional again, Jane knew she needed to see to Loki.

**.x.**

It was fire that brought him to her.

For a week, in the free hours of her day before she retired to the cave for the nights, she gathered up dried grass, bark, branches, and small dead trees that had fallen over in the forest. She brought them all back to the cave and started a stockpile. And then on the one hundred and seventy fifth day of her existence on Vanaheim, Jane lit a fire next to stone where Loki had etched his map. She tended it for a few hours, seated on the ground with nothing but the open expanse of this world that had become hers before her. When she grew tired she left for the cave, letting the fire die on its own. The next day she got up and went about the routines that had become normal to her, but at night she lit the fire again.

It was the same the next night, and the night after that.

The fourth night she began to wonder if perhaps he hadn’t lost all patience.

The fifth night he shaped himself out of the dark.

She’d been staring at the fire, lost in a trance of remembrance. They were happy memories and that fact in and of itself was a testament to just how much she’d managed to mend. How long he’d been standing there she wasn’t sure, but when she saw him she made a soft, startled sound, rising immediately to her feet.

Her mouth had gone dry. She could feel the pounding of her heart, rapid, steady. She’d rehearsed this moment over and over in recent days past,  memorized to a word what she would — wanted — to say. All of that left her now.

“Loki,” was all she managed.

He inclined his head slightly to one side. He was clad as he ever as, the gold of his armor catching the light of the flames.

“Thank you,” she said a little awkwardly, thrown by his silence, his very presence, “for coming.”

He said only, “I was summoned.”

Jane swallowed. “Yeah.”

A long silence followed. This was not going the way she’d wanted or expected it to. There was no trace of emotion on his face, which was half bathed in firelight, half lost to shadows. His voice was level and without emotion. It was as though they’d both been transported back in time, to the early days after his arrival on earth, when they had still been adversaries.

“I admit to being impressed,” he said then, surprising her, “that you were able to adapt enough to live here.”

“It was hard. I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“No?” She heard the speculation in his tone. “I think perhaps you could have.”

“Maybe,” she said. She was unable to stop staring at him. She’d missed him. Missed the way he carried himself. Missed his gaze. Missed his voice.

“Loki …” she said again. “Are you still — ?”

On the side of his face illuminated by the fire’s light, she saw the corner of his mouth quirk upwards. “You are uncharacteristically inarticulate tonight, Jane.”

“You have the tendency to bring that out in me,” she replied with a tentative answering smile.

“And what else do I bring out in you, I wonder?”

_Fear. Anger. Sadness._ She didn’t answer immediately as the answers to his question rolled through her mind.

“Curiosity,” she finally said, moving toward him. He remained motionless as she approached.

“And?”

She was close enough now to touch him, and she wanted to. She lifted one hand and pressed it against his cheek. It was warm from the fire, solid beneath her touch. She splayed her fingers, her eyes tracing their paths. “And … wonder,” she replied, because it was wonder that filled her then as she shaped the lines of his cheek and jaw beneath her palm, as she felt his skin slide against hers and the eldritch, inexplicable way it made her feel.

He took a deep breath. She saw his shoulders rise with the force of it. He asked again, “And?”

Her other hand had lifted, was cupping the other side of his face. His eyes were glued to hers, their brightness subdued by the night, reflecting the flickers of the flames. _I am so close,_ she thought. _This can be mine. This could remake me._

_This could destroy me._

“Possession,” she breathed, and she was so close that the exhale flowed across his lips, warm, moist. And with her hands she directed his head down, and she surged upward, and then her lips met his and she knew that it _would_ be a possession because it could be nothing else.

His reserve had been sundered by her touch, by her words. His hands were firm at her waist, iron in their hold, hauling her against him. His mouth was demanding, his tongue delving and she could _feel_ the urgency in him for this, only this.

Somewhere in between his kisses and the bites he trailed along her jaw and the way his breath trembled over the skin where her neck joined her shoulder she realized one of his hands had fallen away. Dazed, she tried to focus on what he was doing but her attention drifted away immediately by the sensation of his teeth gently tugging at the lobe of her ear. She lifted her hands with the intent of tangling her fingers in the dark lengths of his hair only to find her hands skimming over the skin of his chest — bared, exposed, free from any kind of covering.

_Beautiful_ , she wanted to tell him, because he was. Beautiful and terrible, desirable and terrifying and she wanted him, wanted him because of and despite of it all.

_This could destroy me._

She pulled away just enough to gain some space to stand free. Her movements were uncoordinated, tainted by the lust and anxiety thundering through her. She stripped it away, all her clothing, all her defenses, layer by layer until she was finally laid bare, exposed to the night and the fire and Loki’s eyes —

— and they were wide, focused on her, and devoid of anything but for only one singular _need —_

He closed the distance and his hands were on her, ghosting over her shoulders, trailing over her collarbone and then down, his fingertips a shocking murmur over the swell of her breasts. Jane’s hands were on the buckles fastening his pants, which she tugged on with increasing insistence and inability. “Off,” she finally said, voice strangled because his one of his hands had smoothly slid between the juncture at her legs, because one of his fingers had inserted itself between the damp folds there and was _pressing._

His laugh was soft, a mere exhale. He complied with one hand, because the other was oh-so-busy. Easily, gracefully, he undid the fastenings and let the pants fall, stepping out of them and kicking them to the side. And then he was like her, made bare, and he was so close that she felt the hard line of his erection brushing against her belly.

“Down,” she whispered, a word with so many meanings. And it happened: there was earth under her knees, warmed by the fire. And he was kneeling with her, fingers in her hair, fingers on her clit. And her fingers, well, they were just as active and as they trailed down his chest, his navel, to brush lightly against his cock and then when he inhaled sharply to fasten around the rigid length of him and stroke, once, twice —

“ _Jane._ ”

He’d said her name in so many ways. With the intent to mock. With rage. With condescension. But never like this, with this brand of _need_ , with this trembling, shuddering demand. And Jane savored it, let it wash over her, closed her eyes with all the shameless abandon it brought to her because this was the only way he would ever need her like this.

This was the only way they could be equals.

She shoved him away suddenly, something he didn’t expect. His mouth opened to form a question, opened wider as she bent to take the head of his cock in her mouth. She needed his taste. Would never be able to taste him enough. His fingers found her head, gripped it tightly. And as she opened her mouth wider to take him in further, his fingers knotted in her hair and he groaned. It was the first time she’d heard him make that kind of noise and she wanted more, so much more.

But Loki was Loki. Loki needed to control. And Loki grabbed her shoulders and pushed her upward, Loki slid his hands under her ass, Loki lifted her off the ground and settled her on his thighs. She was kissing him again, cradling his face in her hands. “Jane,” he whispered as she nibbled on his lower lip. “Jane,” he said again as he slid an arm beneath her and lifted her easily, effortlessly. “Jane,” he murmured as, with his free hand, he guided the head of his cock until she felt it brushing against her hot, wet entrance.

She wriggled in his grasp, attempting to force herself downward, onto him. But his grip wouldn’t budge; he held her steady. “Jane,” he said and with the hand not occupied he cupped her chin and tilted her face until she had no choice but to meet his gaze. His eyes were wide, dilated with the onslaught of everything he was feeling, but in them she could still see and recognize the inherent, ever-present shadow of his control.  She stilled in his grasp.

“Only for you,” he said, each word dropping from his lips weighted with emotion, with intent. “Only this, only ever for you.”

And then he was pulling her down and she felt him sliding into her body and she gripped tight, wanting to prolong the sensation of being filled by _Loki._ And he groaned again, the sound a low, gravelly admiration of how sublime the tight walls of her sheath felt as they rhythmically expanded and contracted around his cock. He pushed up into her, his hips shoving upward in short little thrusts until he was buried in her body, until they were melded so completely that Jane’s awareness trembled.

She couldn’t breathe. Every breath was a pant. Her hands were on his shoulders and she tried to change the pace, to force him deeper faster. Loki wouldn’t relinquish control as she knew he wouldn’t, his fingers fanning over her hips as he guided her the way he wanted. His mouth was on hers and then on her neck as he leaned forward and tilted her downward, slowly, keeping her close enough that he was still buried inside her. She mewled softly as his lips trailed down from her neck and then moaned as they crested the rise of her breast to find her nipple.

Her eyes closed. Her eyes opened. Loki’s mouth was laving her flesh, his teeth nipping gently at her nipple. He was inside her. She was around him. And above her lay the universe, the stars lights that flickered as they witnessed their union with all the grand, cold ambivalence of the celestial. She reached up and gripped his shoulders and pulled herself upright, grinding down on his cock with the movement, surprising him.

“Jane.”

_Yes_ , she thought. _I_ _’m Jane. The_ only _Jane._

Pleasure rolled throughout her, consumed her entirely as he surged upward to shove himself deeper once more. That pleasure crested as he breathed her name again and she rode it with focus, with purpose, as it began to peak. This man was claiming her. This man was fucking her. This man was making her his own in a way he’d never done before, with an intent he’d never had before. She loved it. Craved it. Had hunted it. And now, needed it more than anything she’d needed before. It would overtake her. It would overwhelm her. It would overwrite her.

_This_ is _destroying me._

He felt them before she did, the tears. They splashed, one and then two against his chest and he caught her chin and turned her face to his to see the trails they’d left behind, glistening in the light of the flames. She watched the thoughts chase each other in his eyes and she shook her head, _no, no, don_ _’t stop, don’t stop —_

She cried out his name as she came, falling against him as around his cock her body clenched, shuddered. He followed her immediately with a sound that was between a gasp and a shout as he convulsively emptied himself inside her. Panting, her forehead resting against his shoulder, she shut her eyes again. He wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer than he ever had before.

 She tried to slow her breathing and eventually gave up. The fire’s warmth danced across her side; the other side was exposed to the creeping chill of the night air. She didn’t want to move, didn’t want to think, but her thoughts were as always inescapable. It was done. She could never go back and she knew that even if some part of her balked at the fact, she didn’t want to go back. There were no delusions any longer about what Loki was or was capable of and she’d made the choice anyways. He was and always would be the villain.

And she loved him.

**.x.**

Hours later Jane was still awake, staring up at the sky that was gradually brightening in the east. She felt as though she would never sleep again, so charged was her mind. Her body was the perfect kind of sore, the kind she wanted to savor. Loki laid beside her on his side, one arm draped over her midsection. The fire had died to embers, but he’d used that wondrous, terrifying, inexplicable power to keep them both warm against the coolness of the night.

“I’m still mortal,” she said, the first words she’d uttered in hours. “It makes me vulnerable. It’ll make you vulnerable.”

She thought he’d been dozing. Perhaps he had been and her voice had woken him. He replied huskily, “It does not have to be that way.”

She turned her head to look at him, one brow arched in question. His eyes were open in the truest sense of the word, devoid of anything she didn’t want to see. And then, slowly, she watched them fill with lust as he ran his hand up her thigh, as he leaned in closer so that her vision was filled only with him, with his eyes and his mouth and the black, black strands of his hair as they fell across his shoulder.

“It will be transcendent,” he breathed as he parted her legs, as he slid between them and moved down until he could lower his head and slide his tongue over parts of her so delightfully swollen from fucking.

_What will?_ She wanted to ask him, but all that escaped her mouth was a moan shaped as his name.

**.x.**

He drifted off eventually, which surprised her a little. She hadn’t been certain that Loki in his true immortal form ever slept. Perhaps it was only because he was drained by the hours they’d just spent exploring each other. Perhaps it was because he was finally, truly comfortable around her. Whatever the reason, she managed to extricate herself from his grip and stand without rousing him.

The sun was rising and she turned to face it, taking a few steps forward so that she stood in the path of its light, so that she could feel its warmth on her bare feet. The sun rose and fell every day, determined and relentless in its purpose. Jane envied it that purpose. As much as she’d changed — as much as she’d had to change — she was still afraid on some levels, though not nearly as many as before. She was not secure in this latest choice she’d made, to give herself entirely to Loki, to take that last step over the cliff and fall with him in uncontrollable free fall wherever he wanted to go.

But she didn’t regret this last, pivotal decision. No, she didn’t regret it, but she did regret other significant things, and _those_ regrets would haunt her for the rest of her life. They would become weights on her conscience, blotches on her soul, but she knew now that she could survive them. She’d survived far worse.

She’d survived Loki.

But had she, really? She was here, physically in one piece. But there had been a sundering, a line crossed so profound and spirit-deep that she was afraid to examine it head on. She loved him, or rather, she thought she did. Maybe it wasn’t love. Maybe it was only the purest desperation and need. Maybe it was resignation. Or maybe it was what it was: affection and attraction fucked up beyond any kind of normal recognition. There was only one thing out of all of this mess that she was absolutely certain about: it was hers now, and she had to live with it.

She hoped she could do so with grace.

She heard him before he touched her, heard the slight scuff of his foot over the bare earth beneath them both. His fingers trailed over her hip before flattening and pulling her back, gently, against him. His breath whispered against her hair and then she felt his lips on her cheek, so soft. His every movement lulled her into a belief she wasn’t sure she should have: that he was genuine, that this was real, that it would survive.

_I_ _’ll lose myself in you, Loki._

She turned her head in order to meet his lips with hers. She loved the taste of him, the feel of him, his scent. She wondered if she could be sustained by those things and only those things. And she knew, as he kissed her again, and again, and again with mounting insistence, that she was slowly being overwritten. Being overcome.

_I_ _’ve lost myself in you._

And for this Jane, in this reality, in this life, there was no hope of finding her way back.

**.x.**


	15. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

_— 8 years later —_

Bruce Banner can’t sleep.

He’s been trying for hours. The sheets on his bed are heavily mussed, half-on, half-off the mattress, damp with his sweat. The heat is merciless and has been for days. Not for the first time he finds himself wondering with more than a little bitterness if this awful heat is why Fury had called them all here, to an obscure base of operations once owned by the long defunct S.H.I.E.L.D., located in what appears to be the exact middle of a desert. It wouldn’t surprise Bruce if Fury had done it out of vindictiveness. He wasn’t happy with most of the Avengers and hasn’t been for quite some time given their tendency to do things their own way, particularly in times of strife.

Bruce sighs, staring up at the ceiling of his room. To the right of the bed is a door, to the left a large window. To say the room is spartan would be an understatement. The only piece of furniture is the bed. If he wants a shower — and to be honest, he’s been considering a cold one for a couple of hours now — he has to exit his room and head down the hall to the large communal bathroom located four doors down. Gone are the days of operating out of state of the art facilities; the collapse of S.H.I.E.L.D., Ultron’s rise and fall, and the civil war between Earth’s “heroes” has done some serious damage to both Nick Fury’s influence and access to resources.

Bruce sighs again, rubbing at his eyes — aching, gritty — with the heel of one hand. He sits up and swings his legs over the side of the bed, resting his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. He runs his fingers through the thick, upright swaths of his hair that are wet with sweat. He’s staring at the floor now instead of the ceiling, feeling a faint but persistent throbbing come to life behind his left eye. He’s not surprised. He hasn’t been sleeping well since he arrived here 6 days ago. Bringing what’s left of the Avengers together seems to him like a very bad idea considering the animosity that is still present between some of the group’s members. But Fury is right—they’ve been too scattered for too long. They have to rediscover their cohesion. Earth needs them even if they can’t stand each other. Still, Bruce has some very serious concerns about his “teammates” and their ability to play nice, and he suspects that concern is what’s now keeping him from sleep and gifting him with frequent headaches.

He slowly lifts his head and gets to his feet, locking his arms together behind his head and standing on tip toe in a stretch. He holds it for a long span of seconds and then relaxes before turning and padding with bare feet to the door. It opens with a gentle push—the latch is broken, like a lot of other stuff in this joint — and then he’s in the hall, walking quietly past other rooms housing other people, past the bathroom and the promise of a cold shower. He turns left with the corridor, passing other doors before reaching the end of the hall. There’s another door there, a door marked with a red “Emergency” sign, and without hesitation he pushes it open.

He steps out onto sand-dusted concrete, closing his eyes as a warm breeze rolls over him. He’s only wearing boxers and even though the temperature has dropped considerably since the sun went down, it’s still uncomfortably warm. He moves forward a few steps, craning back his head to get a look at the sky. There’s no light pollution here, and what greets his gaze is the gorgeous canvas of night, stars strewn everywhere, a universal road map that he never tires of looking at. He takes a deep breath and then another, eyes fixed on the sky and finally, finally, he feels the weight of tension drain from his body.

For a few sublime, fleeting minutes he’s just existing: his mind is quiet and he’s the only person here in this exact space in this exact time. Another breeze whispers across his skin, warm and gentle, and for the first time in a long time Bruce Banner is at peace.

He hears a footstep behind him and lowers his head. This compound is small and privacy is hard to come by, so he’s not surprised that someone’s managed to interrupt his little zen moment. He half-turns, looking over his shoulder, to see a small, thin familiar form silhouetted by the compound’s watch lights.

He says, “Hey, Nat.”

There was a time when this would have been awkward — after all, he’d passed up a relationship with Natasha and left without explanation after the fall of Ultron. It’d been a couple years since they saw each other after that, and when they finally had met up again reconciliation hadn’t been on her agenda. He’d understood her anger, understood too that he deserved it, and when the shouting was done they’d gone their separate ways once more. But circumstance had thrown them back together time and time again after that, and somehow they’ve made their way back to being if not friends, than something very close to it.

Standing before him now, Nat hasn’t said anything, which isn’t all that surprising. Given recent events, she’s not much for small talk anymore. But she hasn’t moved either, and suddenly he wonders if there’s something wrong. “Hey,” he says, turning fully around and taking two steps forward.

That’s when he realizes it’s not Natasha. He stops, tensing. It’s not Maria Hill either, who’s taller. And those are the only two women in the compound that he’s aware of. So he narrows his eyes, tilts his head, and asks, “Who —?”

The silhouette moves, taking three quick steps toward him, into the pool of illumination from the overhead watch light. Recognition is immediate, unavoidable, _painful_ —

“ _Jane._ ”

And it _is_ Jane. It’s Jane Foster, standing straight before him, corporeal. Real. Breathing. And to Bruce seeing her now is like a fist in the gut, a knife in the heart, and he’s surprised that he’s not physically staggering away given the turmoil in his mind right now.

“Bruce,” she says, and her voice is like another blow, a verbal axe falling to strike him in the core of his soul where his emotions are housed.

He can’t speak. He wants to, but there are a million words flooding his mouth from his brain and he is simply incapable of filtering them all. His tongue has clove to the roof of his mouth. His lungs feel constricted. His heart is racing. He is very, very aware that if he doesn’t calm himself down _right now_ the Other Guy is going make a surprise guest appearance.

And so he closes his eyes and wills this apparition (because what else could it _be_?) to fade away. He counts slowly backward from twenty, taking deep, measured breaths in order to slow his heartbeat. When he opens his eyes and sees she’s still there, he can’t help it. He backs away, first one step, then another, then another. He’s not aware that one hand has fisted, is not aware that he’s holding it now directly over his heart.

“Hello,” she says and her voice is low, soft. He can’t reply because he’s still too busy trying to remember how to think clearly. Finally he manages to choke out something out in a voice that’s barely more than a rasp, “Jane, I …”

But it stops there. They stare at each other in silence. He’s fighting to regain some semblance of coherence, but when he finally speaks all he can say is, “You look good.”

It makes her smile a little. He means it. It’s the truth. His eyes are fixated on her, drinking her in. Her face is the same as it ever was, beautiful with its classic lines, absent of wrinkles and wear. He sees that she has aged, though, because at her temples there are traces of silver in her hair, threading down throughout the long dark strands worn loose over both shoulders. Her clothing is unusual enough for him to take notice, long and flowing, and he’s surprised to see he recognizes the style: it’s Asgardian.

Bruce has in recent years spent some time in that realm, finding himself unwillingly embroiled in yet another titanic struggle between Thor’s people and an evil force hellbent on destruction. Jane’s clothing now reminds him of that unpleasant time, and he forces his eyes upward again to focus on her face. She’s still watching him with a faint trace of a smile, and he can’t help but remember the last time she smiled at him, so very long ago. That memory hurts more than most do.

It hurts to remember just how much he’d loved her.

When he speaks, his voice is soft like hers but ragged, carrying within it all of his emotions dragged over the knife-edge of recollection. “Where did you go? Thor wouldn’t tell me. He’d only say you were safe.”

“And I was,” she replies. The smile has faded from her face and her expression now has become a little wistful, a little sad. “I have been.”

“But … where?”

“Everywhere, Bruce.” She tilts her head back so that she can see the sky, mirroring what he’d been doing just a short time ago. “Anywhere I wanted to go, I went.”

“Alone?”

She shakes her head, but doesn’t answer. She looks back to him and it strikes him suddenly: she is different somehow. This is Jane but not Jane. It confounds him. It saddens him.

It frightens him.

“Why are you here now, Jane? What happened to you? Are you okay? For you to disappear like that, after all you’d gone through … ”

She’s still watching him through dark eyes that are calm and familiar, but there’s something else lingering in their depths that worries him. It’s a new element, one he doesn’t remember. He’s thrown a lot of questions at her and she wades through them carefully, with purpose. “After Surtr … well. I never thought I’d be whole again. I thought ... well, you know what I thought. I was ..." here she pauses, her eyes on the ground at her feet, a faint frown marring the skin between her brows. "I was sundered. But I found ways to piece it all back together. It took so long, Bruce, so long, but I did it. I'm me again."

He’s shaking his head but isn’t aware of that fact. He knows now what it is that’s so different about her. She’s still beautiful, yes, achingly so, but it’s a cold beauty, a distant beauty, the same unobtainable beauty the stars share. There are harder edges to her now, to the set of her jaw and the slow blink of her eyes, in the line of her closed mouth.

He asks, “What about Loki?”

She looks away, briefly, lowering her eyes. “I don’t know.”

He frowns, confused by her answer. He is almost certain she is lying. She looks up at him again, so he takes the opportunity to give voice to some of the hundreds of other questions he has. “How did you get here? Why are you here now?”

She moves then, walking slowly up to him. They are close, so close right now and if he wanted he could wrap his arms around her. If he wanted, he could bend just a little and press his lips to hers, slide his cheek against hers. And he wants to do all of those things so badly that there’s a fine tremor coursing throughout his limbs. He’s riveted by her presence, by her scent — faint, otherworldly, entrancing — and by her eyes, those dark eyes that are staring into his own and are layered with shadows that weren’t there before, once upon a time.

“I’ve … learned some things,” she tells him in that same soft voice. “And those things are how I’m here right now with you.”

He absorbs what she’s saying and instantly understands that the reason she seems so different and so alien is because she has somehow been able to absorb some of the mystery of the cosmos. She has been affected by it. Perhaps she’s even been remade?

“Why,” he whispers, feeling suddenly and strangely alarmed, “are you here?”

Her smile is slow and sad and he feels a knot of emotion form in his throat at the sight of it. “I’ve come to say goodbye.”

“I don’t — you just got here! What do you mean? Just answer me, Jane, explain it all to me! Please!”

Her smile has faded and her expression has altered and he sees this new exterior of hers, so cool and foreign, crack a little. He sees the sudden welling of tears in her eyes and it’s all he can do not to grab her and crush her to him.

“I wanted to see you one last time, as a friend,” she says. And before he can even try to think up a reply she moves closer, tilting her head back. Her lips are on his and they are cold, so cold and when she pulls away he sees that the tears have spilled over, sliding rapidly down her face.

“Jane,” he whispers and then he’s reaching for her because it’s all he can think of doing. But she’s gone between one fraction of a second and the next. She’s gone and it’s just him standing out here beneath the desert sky, shuddering under the enormity of what has just transpired.

“Jane,” he says, louder, calling out to her, that one word a desperate plea.

His only answer is the breeze.

**.x.**

Sleep for Bruce after that was a laughably remote possibility and so he didn’t even try. Instead he roamed the fenced compound, searching every exterior and interior inch for a sign that Jane had been real, that Jane had been here. He finds nothing, no indication, but as he looks he can still feel the press of her cold lips against his. He thinks that that particular recollection has the potential to drive him mad.

What he should have done is immediately find Fury and notify him. What he should have done was wake the other Avengers and fill them in. What he should have done was confront Thor and demand to know what exactly had happened with Jane that the Odinson had been so unwilling to share. He should have done so many things. He’s done none of them.

Dawn is here now and he’s sitting in the large room that passes as the mess. He’s hunched over in his chair, still in his boxers, uncaring that people are filtering in to grab breakfast and are casting bewildered glances his way. His elbows are propped on the table, his head lowered between them with his hands clasped behind his head. He is exhausted. He is confounded. He is afraid.

“Dr. Banner!”

The sound of his name makes him raise his head, twist around in his chair to look toward the entrance of the mess. It’s Steve Rogers that’s calling him, waving him over with one hand. Bruce stands, shoving his chair away, and makes his way over to the captain.

“What is it?”

Rogers looks him over once, clearly noting the lack of clothing. He says nothing about it, however, instead saying, “Fury wants us upstairs. Now. There’s some kind of emergency.”

And so Bruce follows Rogers down the hall to a stairwell. They head up to the third floor of the compound, each taking the stairs two at a time. They enter another corridor and when Rogers enters a room on the right, Bruce follows right on his heels.

They’re all here, those that have arrived thus far: Stark, Hill, Natasha, Barton, Fury. Bruce spies Thor next to the window and all he can think of doing is charging up to the Asgardian, shoving him against the window and demanding to know what exactly has happened to Jane, why she is now the way she is. He’s about to do it, too, until Fury’s sharp directive whips his attention around.

“ _Look._ ”

He does, turning to face the large screen embedded in the wall. It’s showing some kind of live feed from a news station, but Bruce isn’t reading the scrolling text at the bottom. He’s staring at the person that’s center frame in what is clearly footage shot from a helicopter, staring at the man clad in green and gold who’s standing so imperiously on the roof of a skyscraper somewhere on Earth. His heart stutters in his chest.

It’s Loki.

Behind Loki there are holes forming in the sky, dark chasms that coruscate in shades of black and gold. Spilling forth from those holes are ships, all sizes and shapes, so very obviously alien in design.

It’s an army.

The view from the live feed is swinging around as the helicopter circles. And then the pieces fall together for Bruce and he stumbles back, pierced by an agony from within unlike anything he’s ever felt before because it’s Jane standing next to Loki. Jane, clad in a gown of flowing blue and gray, bearing a circlet of silver on her brow, looking imperious and cold and untouchable.

It’s Jane.

And she is the queen to Loki’s king.

**.x.**

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As a writer who has a very bad habit of leaving works unfinished, the fact that I managed to complete this one makes it a special kind of accomplishment. I started this in 2013 and to be quite honest, there were times where I was certain that I'd never be able to get it done.
> 
> I couldn't (and wouldn't) have done this without all the support, kudos, comments, reviews, and private messages I received from all of you. So: thank you. Thank you for your patience, your criticisms, your questions, and your insight. It's been a long ride but it's over now and I hope you guys enjoyed reading it as much as I did writing it. :)


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